In the unlikely event
Readers rate it 3.3 (52 on Hardcover)
401 pages · Released 2015 · Alfred A. Knopf
Content report card
In the unlikely event parent’s guide: what’s inside
LGBTQ+ themes
What it offers
Educational value
A note for parents
This historical coming-of-age novel is grounded in real 1950s aircraft disasters that shaped a community and a young girl's life. While the premise involves tragic plane crashes, Blume handles the grief and loss with emotional depth rather than graphic detail, making it appropriate for mature middle and high school readers. The story balances heavy themes with authentic period detail, first love, and ultimately resilient characters who model how communities and individuals process tragedy.
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From the publisher
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 ev... 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.
Shelved under
- Grief
- Family secrets
- Homecoming
- Nineteen fifties
- Aircraft accidents
- Fiction
- Fiction, historical
- Fiction, family life
- Jews, fiction
- Fiction, coming of age
- New jersey, fiction
- nyt:combined-print-and-e-book-fiction=2015-06-21
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ISBN 9781101875049 · Alfred A. Knopf