{"id":570,"date":"2024-11-16T11:33:06","date_gmt":"2024-11-16T09:33:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/?p=570"},"modified":"2026-04-19T14:33:35","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T12:33:35","slug":"book-review-the-crew-by-michael-mohr-%e2%ad%90%e2%ad%90%e2%ad%90%e2%ad%90%e2%ad%90","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/?p=570","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: The Crew by Michael Mohr"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Review originally published on Reedsy Discovery. View it HERE.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

All sixteen-year-old Jack Donnigan wants is to rebel against the systems that control him\u2014his protective mother, his \u2018dictatorlike\u2019 school principal and limiting societal norms. He decides to set change into motion by approaching a member of The Crew, an infamous group of punk kids from Jack\u2019s school. This group is ruled by Cannonball, who eagerly accepts Jack into The Crew, christens Jack with the new name \u2018Dog\u2019, and introduces him to punk culture icons such as Johnny Rotten from the Sex Pistols and The Ramones, and books like Crime and Punishment<\/em> (Dostoevsky) and 1984<\/em> (George Orwell). As Jack begins to carve his way into his rebel lifestyle, he finds new challenges awaiting him\u2014some of which may lead him to the most difficult choices he\u2019s ever had to make.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This story is incredibly well-written, the prose including strong metaphorical language and the story’s voice shining with personality:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cThe faces of the nerds I\u2019d spent time with freshman year buzzed across my mental landscape. I wanted to hurl my fist into one of their faces. But they\u2019d been so unbelievably kind. Compassionate my mother would probably say. Whatever. I wanted to smash their compassion.\u201d (Page 18).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I absolutely devoured\u00a0The Crew<\/em>. I loved that the book included punk references\u2014they really added to the story. Lines such as \u201cLife replaced theory\u201d from\u00a0Crime and Punishment\u00a0<\/em>(Dostoevsky) gave Jack guidelines to follow in his search for emancipation from the system. Jack\u2019s reaction to hearing these quotes, however, also shows the reader how naive Jack can be\u2014often misunderstanding or reinterpreting these guidelines to suit his selfish needs. It made for great juxtaposition, creating the perfect flawed character.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jack is a wonderfully complex character, who despite his mistakes, is easy to empathize with. Anyone who has gone through even a small rebellion in their life can put themselves in Jack\u2019s proverbial Chuck Taylors. From the moment Jack\u2014now Dog\u2014joins The Crew, he orchestrates his transformation, carefully assessing each leg of the journey as it comes. He looks at the systems he wants to break down, then analyses the systems within The Crew to build his way up within the hierarchy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cFor me individuality was key… (to base decisions) on my own understanding, my own experience, my own examination of life, my own existential beliefs. That had…dictated everything about me as far back as I could remember.\u201d (Page 191).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Despite his careful thinking, Jack\u2019s naivety and lack of experience cause him to misstep; he often mistakes arrogance for power or lust for love.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI\u2019d metamorphosed, like I\u2019d wanted to, only I\u2019d become…something foreign and ugly.\u201d (Page 162).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

He is, in essence, still only a sixteen-year-old boy transitioning into the complex world of manhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A critique that I have toward Jack\u2019s character is that I wish Jack\u2019s backstory had been told in a little more detail. His need for rebellion stems from childhood issues which are only touched on briefly. Perhaps a more detailed flashback-style chapter would have brought these issues to life, helping us understand Jack even better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The other characters in the story were vivid and added great flavor and tension to The Crew<\/em>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cannonball appears to be a powerful new friend to Jack, yet the reader senses straightaway that their meeting has set into motion events that will not be easy to witness. Cannonball is the leader of The Crew and he\u2019d like to keep it that way regardless of who may be hurt in the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bear, who joined The Crew after Jack, serves as a mirror for Jack to assess how he himself places within The Crew\u2019s hierarchy. When Cannonball treats Bear like a slave, Jack can see that Cannonball\u2019s leadership stands against everything The Crew rejects; if Bear can be ordered around by Cannonball and ruled by the fear of punishment, isn\u2019t Cannonball just another \u2018fascist dictator\u2019?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cIn short, Cannon had become…the prodigal son of the system.\u201d (Page 191).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Sarah, Jack\u2019s love interest, was a difficult character for me to place. Her and Jack\u2019s relationship goes from zero to a hundred very quickly, yet we know little about her. I wanted to know<\/em> more<\/em>. At the same time, Mohr seems to have kept information about Sarah purposefully limited, because Jack himself doesn\u2019t care as deeply for Sarah as he thinks he does. Again, the world of romantic relationships is brand new to Jack. He has no idea what he\u2019s doing! He seems to be in love with the idea of Sarah, not who she really is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Crew<\/em> has a very open-ended ending. One asks: what will happen to Jack now? How will he survive and who will he turn to for help? Despite this open ending, a metamorphosis of character has clearly occurred, and the reader feels satisfied that this chapter of Jack\u2019s story has come to a close. What I do know with certainty is that if Michael Mohr wrote The Crew 2<\/em>, I would definitely be reading it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

TRIGGER WARNINGS: Drug use, References to abuse, Mild Violence, Political\/Religious Views<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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When two roads diverged, Jack chose the one that would break the system. But change is hard, especially when you’re only sixteen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":210962654,"featured_media":572,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[3328],"tags":[7215,774538946,178,110607,1440,113811,252928610,309,8154,84917],"class_list":["post-570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book-reviews","tag-book-review","tag-book-reviews","tag-books","tag-coming-of-age","tag-punk","tag-ramones","tag-reedsy","tag-reviews","tag-romance","tag-sex-pistols"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/the-crew-michael-mohr-e1776599996422.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/210962654"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=570"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":633,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions\/633"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/khcreates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}