61 pages • 2 hours read
Caroline B. CooneyCode Orange
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2005A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 7-9Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary
Mitty’s fears have suddenly ambushed him, and he finds it very hard to sleep as he is terrified of the possibility of having contracted smallpox. When he gets to English class, his teacher tells him that she is impressed with his Beowulf test and, for his paper, suggests that he make his essay cross-curricular by “compar[ing] Grendel and the other monsters in Beowulf to the monsters of infectious disease” (76). Mitty is not enthusiastic about this idea at all, but his teacher fails to notice.
At lunch, Derek talks about his project. He now thinks that a country, and not an individual, is responsible for the death of Ottilie Lundgren, a woman who received anthrax in her mail:
My theory is that a rogue country is endlessly surfing the Net, looking for opportunities… The terrorists don’t care if they find anthrax or smallpox—they just want to kill people. So, they get their anthrax or whatever, pick a place like Grand Central Station, send a million commuters into such a panic… (78).
Mitty listens to Derek’s theory and is paralyzed with fear.
In science class, they go to the library again, and this time Mitty focuses on bioterrorism. Because no one has immunity to smallpox, the whole world is at risk. In a city , a disease like smallpox, whose symptoms can take twelve to fourteen days to show up, could spread easily because many people could be have the disease and not even realize it.
Olivia shows Mitty a book called The Travel Letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Lady Montagu has been disfigured by smallpox and worries about her son contracting the disease. She lives in Turkey, since her husband is the British ambassador there, and she learns that to immunize their children against smallpox, Turkish mothers “would have a slumber party for all the neighborhood children. They’d scrape up the kids’ arms and rub in pus from smallpox victims” (81).
Olivia also tells Mitty about insufflation, a form of immunity practiced in ancient China: “What they would do is, they would grind dried smallpox scabs into a powder and breathe it up into their noses through a straw. And insufflation also conferred immunity” (81). Mitty is elated upon hearing this. The ancient Chinese intentionally did what he accidentally did. Overjoyed, he is ready to celebrate, and the librarian reprimands him. But Mitty doesn’t care and even tries to dance with the librarian. Suddenly, everything has changed for him. He has been given his life back.
Despite Mitty’s joy, the updates at the ends of the chapters continue: “It had now been five days since Mitty Blake had opened the envelope” (83).
Chapter 8 Summary
That weekend, the Blakes go to their home in Connecticut, spending much of the rainy, snowy days watching basketball games on TV and snacking. Mitty is feeling much better. He enjoys spending time with his parents and is full of affection for them. He is also very happy not to have to worry about developing smallpox.
When they return to the apartment Sunday night, Mitty summons the energy to do some work on his school assignments, which he has been ignoring all weekend. He learns more about the Turkish slumber parties and how the kids had to be quarantined because they would be able to give others smallpox even if they had a mild case. He also learns, much to his grave disappointment, that insufflation rarely works. Suddenly, the reprieve he felt from the disease is gone, and he is sure that he is definitely getting smallpox. Though there is a big supply of the vaccine, no one is vaccinated anymore. The vaccine has no effect after someone has been exposed to smallpox for more than three days. Mitty has been exposed for seven days. He feels doomed.
That night, he can’t sleep. He emails various medical research societies about the scabs that he found. He vacillates between feeling ridiculous for acting the way he is to feeling terror at what the future holds. The only thing he can think to do is grab a carton of chocolate ice cream and eat it in his living room with its fabulous view of the New York City skyline.
Chapter 9 Summary
At school, Mitty does not feel like himself. All of his usual Monday morning routines seem foreign. He has a hard time focusing on anything beyond smallpox. He wonders what the responses to his emails will be. Olivia asks him what’s wrong because he is so listless and quiet, but he tries to act as if nothing is the matter.
When he gets home, he finds lots of email responses from reporters, scientists, pharmaceutical companies, and even someone who is interested in purchasing the scabs. All want to know more and to hear back from Mitty ASAP. Some have forwarded his email to USAMRIID, IAIDR (International Association for Infectious Disease Research), and the CDC. One assumes it’s a hoax and tells Mitty that he has forwarded the email to the FBI. Mitty worries that it will be easy for the FBI, and really anyone, to track down who he is and where he lives.
Chapters 7-9 Analysis
While Mitty continues to do well in school, with both his English and biology teachers praising his efforts, Mitty’s fears continue to worsen. When Olivia shares that insufflation, a practice formerly used in China, may provide immunity to smallpox, Mitty is overjoyed—until he finds out that such hopes of immunity were not warranted. The happiness he felt over the weekend spent in the country, when he was comforted both by his love for his family and his trust that he was immune, vanishes once he returns to the city. He is again sure that he is doomed.
His parents don’t notice anything unusual. They have lots of distractions. But Olivia realizes something’s wrong. Mitty cannot share what’s happening with anyone. He is trapped in his fear. Alone, he reaches out to the anonymous internet, sending out multiple queries to various organizations. Unsure what else to do other than wait, he stares out at the skyline of New York, the city he loves.
But the next day, when the internet reaches back out to him in the form of twenty-seven faceless responses, Mitty is overwhelmed. He thrives on face-to-face interactions, so this is a very different type of communication for him. Technology has the power to send his questions all over the world, even to people he does not intend to write to. He had hoped he was confiding in the anonymity of the internet. But the internet is anything but anonymous. He has just opened himself to the world, the good and the bad.
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