In the Unlikely Event (Blume)

In the Unlikely Event 
Judy Blume, 2015
Knopf Doubleday
416 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781101875049


Summary
A richly textured and moving story of three generations of families, friends and strangers, whose lives are profoundly changed by unexpected events.
 
In 1987, Miri Ammerman returns to her hometown of Elizabeth, New Jersey, to attend a commemoration of the worst year of her life. Thirty-five years earlier, when Miri was fifteen, and in love for the first time, a succession of airplanes fell from the sky, leaving a community reeling.

Against this backdrop of actual events that Blume experienced in the early 1950s, when airline travel was new and exciting and everyone dreamed of going somewhere, she paints a vivid portrait of a particular time and place—Nat King Cole singing "Unforgettable," Elizabeth Taylor haircuts, young (and not-so-young) love, explosive friendships, A-bomb hysteria, rumors of Communist threat. And a young journalist who makes his name reporting tragedy. Through it all, one generation reminds another that life goes on.

In the Unlikely Event is vintage Judy Blume, with all the hallmarks of Judy Blume’s unparalleled storytelling, and full of memorable characters who cope with loss, remember the good times and, finally, wonder at the joy that keeps them going. (From the publisher.)

Author Bio
• Birth— February 12, 1938
• Where—Elizabeth, New Jersey, USA
• Education—B.A., New York University
• Awards—(see below)
• Currently—lives in Key West, Florida


Judy Blume (born Judith Sussman) is an American writer. Her novels for children and young adults have exceeded sales of 80 million and have been translated into 32 languages. In 1996 she won the Margaret Edwards Award from the American Library Association for her contribution to writing for teens.

Blume's novels for teenagers have tackled racism (Iggie's House), menstruation (Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.), divorce (It's Not the End of the World, Just As Long As We're Together), bullying (Blubber), masturbation (Deenie; Then Again, Maybe I Won't) and teen sex (Forever). Blume has used these subjects to generate discussion, but they have also been the source of controversy regarding age-appropriate reading.

Early life
Blume was born and raised in Elizabeth, New Jersey, the daughter of homemaker Esther (nee Rosenfeld) and dentist Ralph Sussman. She has a brother, David, who is five years older. Her family was Jewish. Blume has recalled, "I spent most of my childhood making up stories inside of my head."

She graduated from Battin High School in 1956, then enrolled in Boston University. In the first semester, she was diagnosed with mononucleosis and took a brief leave from school before graduating from New York University in 1961 with a bachelor's degree in Education.

In 1951 and 1952, there were three airplane crashes in her hometown of Elizabeth, New Jersey. 118 people died in the crashes, and Blume’s father, who was a dentist, helped to identify the unrecognizable remains. Blume says she "buried" these memories until she began writing her 2015 novel In the Unlikely Event, the plot of which revolves around the crashes.

Career
A lifelong avid reader, Blume first began writing when her children were attending preschool and published her first book, The One in the Middle Is the Green Kangaroo, in 1969. The decade that followed proved to be her most prolific, with 13 more books being published, including many of her most well-known titles, such as Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. (1970), Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing (1972), Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great (1972), and Blubber (1974). A number of Blume's books appear on the list of top all-time bestselling children's books.

After publishing novels for young children and teens, Blume tackled another genre—adult reality and death. Her novels Wifey (1978) and Smart Women (1983) shot to the top of The New York Times best-seller list. Wifey has become a bestseller, with over 4 million copies sold to date. Her third adult novel Summer Sisters (1998) was widely praised and has sold more than 3 million copies. It spent 5 months on The New York Times Bestseller list, with the hardcover reaching #3 while the paperback spent several weeks at #1. Her fourth adult novel, In the Unlikely Event, came out in 2015.

Awards
Judy Blume has won more than 90 literary awards, including three lifetime achievement awards in the US. The ALA Margaret A. Edwards Award recognizes one writer and a particular body of work for "significant and lasting contribution to young adult literature."

She won the annual award in 1996 citing the single book Forever, published in 1975. According to the citation,

She broke new ground in her frank portrayal of Michael and Katherine, high school seniors who are in love for the first time. Their love and sexuality are described in an open, realistic manner and with great compassion.

In April 2000 the Library of Congress named her to its Living Legends in the Writers and Artists category for her significant contributions to America's cultural heritage. In 2004 she received the annual Distinguished Contribution to American Letters Medal of the National Book Foundation as someone who "has enriched [American] literary heritage over a life of service, or a corpus of work."


Other work
The film version of Blume's 1981 novel Tiger Eyes was directed by the author's son, Lawrence Blume. Released in 2012, it stars Willa Holland as Davey and Amy Jo Johnson as Gwen Wexler.

Throughout Blume's career, she has also made efforts to advocate for organizations that support intellectual freedom. "Finding herself at the center of an organized book banning campaign in the 1980's she began to reach out to other writers, as well as teachers and librarians, who were under fire." This led to Blume joining the National Coalition Against Censorship.

All of her efforts go into helping protect the freedom to read. She is also the founder and trustee of a charitable and education foundation, called The Kids Fund. Blume serves on the board for other organizations, such as Author's Guild, Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, Key West Literary Seminar, and National Coalition Against Censorship.

Personal life
On August 15, 1959, in the summer of her freshman year of college, she married John M. Blume, whom she had met while a student at New York University. He became a lawyer, while she was a homemaker before supporting her family by teaching and writing. They had two children. The couple divorced in 1976. Blume has stated that Lawrence was the inspiration for the character of Fudge. Blume has one grandchild, a grandson whom Blume credits with encouraging her to write the most recent Fudge books.

Shortly after her separation from her first husband, Blume met Thomas A. Kitchens, a physicist. The couple married in 1976, moved to New Mexico, but divorced in 1978. She later spoke about their split: "It was a disaster, a total disaster. After a couple years, I got out. I cried every day. Anyone who thinks my life is cupcakes is all wrong."

A mutual friend introduced her to George Cooper, a former law professor turned non-fiction writer. Blume and Cooper have been married since 1987. They reside in Key West.  (Adapted from Wikipedia. Accessed 7/14/2015.)

Book Reviews
Judy Blume isn’t just revered, she’s revolutionary.... The novel moves with momentum, told in short chapter bursts, newspaper reports and even scripted dialogue.... Blume nails every 1950s detail, from the refinished basements with wet bars and knotty-pine walls to Elizabeth Taylor haircuts and mentions of Bogart and Bacall.... Blume, whose fiction for adults has the same emotional immediacy as her books for children, makes us feel the pure shock and wonder of living.
Caroline Leavitt - New York Times Book Review


A heartfelt novel intended to be heartwarming. In that it fully succeeds.
Sherryl Connelly - New York Daily News


It’s Judy Blume and, therefore, it’s gold.... Despite tragedy at its core, [In the Unlikely Event] soars.
Jacqueline Cutler - Newark Star Ledger


Comfort reading at its most soothing, the turn of its pages like sitting down with a beloved, long-lost friend.
Lucy Scholes - Independent (UK)


Quite simply, extraordinary.
Viv Groskop - Guardian (UK)


Blume, in clear and forthright storytelling, creates realistic characters searching for happiness while dodging the obstacles placed in their way. She does it with a compassionate understanding of life’s setbacks and the power we all have to survive and move on.
Carol Memmott - Chicago Tribune


In the Unlikely Event gives us everything that Blume is known (and beloved) for—the fierce, fraught nature of young relationships, the comfort and confines of cultural identity, the messiness and joys of the body—and takes it to a new level. This novel is her most ambitious to date, and she lives up to its reach with her characteristic frankness, compassion, and charm.
Gayle Brandeis - San Francisco Chronicle


Will appeal to loyal fans as well as new readers.... In Miri, Blume deftly exposes the inner life of a teenager girl during the 1950s—and not the sanitized version so often portrayed. In the Unlikely Event integrates Blume’s acclaimed observation of the teenage experience with intimate knowledge of an unusual series of events, making it a page-turner with cross-generational appeal.
Meganne Fabrega - Minneapolis Star-Tribune


Satisfying, heartfelt.... Delivers on the warm nostalgia that we remember from Blume’s earlier books.... It is her signature unparalleled ability to capture the innermost lives of teenagers that makes In the Unlikely Event vintage Judy Blume.
Melissa M. Firman - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette


[In the Unlikely Event] does not disappoint.... Blume’s great gift is [her] personal touch; her unflinching but reassuring voice—that of a no-nonsense big sister who gives it to you straight, then gives you a hug—characterizes her adult novels as distinctly as it does her YA output.
Emily Simon - Buffalo News


Blume creates characters who are real and sympathetic.
Amanda St. Amand - St. Louis Post-Dispatch


The details of the time and place ring true, and so do the feelings of the characters.
Margaret Quamme - Columbus Dispatch


An ambitious book that combines adult experience with the sweet familiarity of Blume’s writing for and about younger people.... The novel rivals Tolstoy or Ferrante in its number of characters, families, and stories, and it feels not just believable but like a regular preteen-style Judy Blume page-turner, emotionally resonant and down-to-earth at once.... It’s also the experience of being in Blume’s authoritative hands, reading a dramatic story about daily life told in a funny, orderly, honest style. Blume is always kind to her readers; the suffering her characters experience feels real but never cruel, never melodramatic.... [Her books are] deftly crafted, and she’s done the hard work for us.... Reading In the Unlikely Event is like reconnecting with a long-lost friend.
Sarah Larson - The New Yorker


Judy Blume is back—and on her game!... A deftly written story that captures a town coping with loss and the sudden fame that horrible tragedy brings. You won’t want to turn the last page.
Kim Hubbard - People Magazine


Excellent and satisfying.... Has all the elements of Blume’s best books: the complex relationships between friends and family members, the straight talk and lack of shame about sex, and, most of all, the compassionate insight into the pleasures and pains of growing up.
Aimee Levitt - Chicago Reader

Vividly rendered.... Blume deftly demonstrates just how different the personal fallout from tragedy can turn out to be.... As Blume proves over and over again not just in In the Unlikely Event but in all of her fiction, life does go on in spite of hardship. We love. We lose. We fail. We may fall. But the lucky ones, we try our best to endure.
Alexis Burling - Oregonian


Has [Judy Blume’s] signature warm, personal touch.
Megan O’Grady - Vogue.com


The three fatal plane crashes that hit Elizabeth, N.J., during the winter of 1951–52 are the inspiration for Elizabeth-native Blume's latest adult novel...while posing the question, how do individuals, families, and communities, deal with disaster?... [C]haracteristically accessible, frequently charming, and always deeply human.
Publishers Weekly


(Starred review.)There is no surprise that [In the Unlikely Event] is smoothly written, and its story compelling. The setting—the early 1950s—is especially well realized.... A new Blume novel will always be big news. —Michael Cart
Booklist


[A] story that mingles facts...[with] fictional characters. Though it's not always clear where truth ends and imagination begins.... Though it doesn't feel much like an adult novel, this book will be welcomed by any Blume fan who can handle three real tragedies and a few four-letter words.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
1. Discuss the environment of Elizabeth, New Jersey, before the crashes occur. How would you describe the community? How does the community band together after the first crash?

2. Throughout In the Unlikely Event, newspaper clippings are interspersed among the text. How do those articles help to provide context for the events that occur? How did they aid your understanding of changes in Elizabeth?

3. Class and status play a role throughout In the Unlikely Event. How does Miri see herself in the socioeconomic structure of Elizabeth? When does she feel most uncomfortable with her family’s position? How does her idea of relative wealth change once she meets Mason?

4. Discuss Miri’s relationship with her mother. How would you define the relationship between Miri and Rusty at the beginning of the novel? Are there special pressures on Miri because she is an only child? How do Irene and Henry mitigate the mother-daughter disagreements between Miri and Rusty? Does the relationship change once Miri has her own children? If so, how?  

5. In the Unlikely Event is arguably a novel about the crashes as much as it is one about Henry Ammerman’s development as a journalist. How does Henry’s career evolve over the course of the novel? Is he ever conflicted by his role in reporting the tragedy? How has reportage changed since the 1950s?

6. How does Miri’s idea of friendship change throughout the novel? Discuss the scene in which Miri visits Natalie in the hospital. How does this incident set the tone for their relationship going forward?

7. Discuss the conspiracy theories that emerge after the crashes. For the teenagers in the novel, how do these rumors act as a means of coping?

8. On page 29, it states that "Miri couldn’t help wishing" she had a father like Dr. Osner. What does she desire in a relationship with a father? Discuss her reunion with her biological father. How does this experience change her? Does she ever find someone to fulfill the role of father in her life?

9. Discuss how working women are portrayed in the novel. What challenges do these women face? Can you point to any particular incidents in which the working women—particularly Rusty, Daisy, and Christina—face discrimination or judgment for their roles in the workplace?

10. The crashes create a sense of palpable fear and anxiety for the residents of Elizabeth throughout In the Unlikely Event. How does it affect Miri on a psychological level? What about Natalie?

11. Several budding romances play out over the course of In the Unlikely Event. What relationship most surprised you? Whom did you root for?

12. How is teen culture described throughout In the Unlikely Event? What influence does pop culture have on Miri and her peers? Were you able to trace any similarities between the teens of the 1950s and the teens of today?

13. Discuss the events of the reunion. Did the characters’ lives turn out differently from how you would have expected? Who changed the most?

14. Judy Blume has had a prolific career writing books for readers of all ages. How many of her previous novels, if any, have you read? How did your reading experience of In the Unlikely Event compare with her other works? Are you able to pinpoint anything in the writing or character development that felt distinctly "Judy Blume" in style or execution?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)

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