56 pages • 1 hour read
Judy BlumeSummer Sisters
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1998A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 4Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 4: “Didn’t We Almost Have It All (1987-1990)”
Part 4, Chapter 35 Summary
Vix, Maia, and Paisley move to New York City together. Paisley works for ABC, and Maia gets a job on Wall Street, but the October 19, 1987, stock market crash (Black Monday) leads to her termination. Maia thinks she has ovarian cancer, but the test results are negative, so she applies to law school.
Caitlin visits Vix in New York City, and Vix stays with her at Lamb’s apartment in the Carlyle Hotel. Caitlin wishes she were 12 again, but Vix doesn’t share her wish. Caitlin thought Vix would marry Bru and have an average life. Vix reminds Caitlin that she signed the NBO pact, and Caitlin laughs before showing Vix a flamenco dance she learned.
Maia thinks Caitlin is jealous of her and Paisley. She claims there’s a version of Caitlin in every middle school—Vix has to get on with her life. Paisley extols Vix’s dedication to Caitlin and her rejection of Bru’s wedding proposal. Paisley doesn’t fantasize about Bru anymore. She thinks about this guy who’s pitching a sitcom.
Part 4, Chapter 36 Summary
The three young women share a loft, one bathroom, and a small kitchen in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood. There’s little privacy, though. Worried about AIDS, only Paisley has much sex. She doesn’t think she’ll get AIDS: Her partners attend Ivy League schools and come from “good families.” Maia worries Paisley will bring home a sexually transmitted illness, so she swabs the toilet seat and lectures Paisley about condoms.
For her Squire-Oates job, Vix edits videotapes of corporate executives and spots their communication flaws: Maybe he mumbles, or perhaps she plays with her jewelry. Vix comes up with good ideas, but Dinah, her boss, takes credit for them. Dinah calls Vix a “puppy,” and Vix meditates on the distorted conception of adulthood.
Abby manages the Somers Foundation and reorganizes it. Gus writes for The Oregonian and meets Caitlin in Seattle, along with James and Donny, two gay friends of hers. Caitlin can’t believe she once tried to “seduce” Gus, and she tells Gus that Bru and Vix eloped. The news shocks him, and Caitlin laughs—she’s joking.
Part 4, Chapter 37 Summary
Caitlin wants Vix to come to Seattle, but Vix declines. Caitlin thinks Vix is the same, but she’s not: She graduated from Harvard, has lived in New York City for a year, and worked for Dinah. She voices her frustrations to Dinah, but Dinah is condescending. On the street, she spots a singing unhoused person (“the Bag Lady”) and worries she could wind up like her. Vix takes a job at a quirky PR firm, Marstello, and Dinah calls her a “bitch” and throws a paperweight at her.
Caitlin swears off sex, and she’s starting a restaurant, Eurotrash, with James and Donny. Vix doesn’t swear off with sex, but she mostly sticks to fantasies about Bru. One time, she fantasizes about Caitlin’s flamenco dance.
Part 4, Chapter 38 Summary
Vix signs up for a school-volunteer program and tutors a 16-year-old girl, D’Nisha Cross. She lives in the projects and wants to learn computers—computers equal a job. Vix thinks about luck and how her life would be different without Caitlin, Lamb, and Abby. She goes to Atlantic City to test her luck and meets a Cornel graduate, Luke. She tells him her name is D’Nisha Cross, and she works for ABC. They have sex in his hotel suite.
Donny has “the disease” and is in hospice care. Caitlin calls Gus and condemns him for not covering the “massacre.” She also helps Vix bring in a client (an edgy fashion designer) for Marstello.
Part 4, Chapter 39 Summary
Paisley brings Vix to a fundraiser, where she meets Will (C. Willard Trenholm), whose family owns a museum-like duplex on Park Avenue. He takes her to the ballet, a production of Shakespeare, and fancy restaurants. Will also sends her flowers and chocolates (which Maia likes). While he reads business periodicals, Vix fantasizes about Bru. Bluntly, she tells Will about her family and calls him a “snob.” She then breaks up with him. Her friends think she should have stayed with him, but Vix’s life is already “full.” She does yoga and volunteering, and she’s considering starting a production company with another young woman from Harvard.
Part 4, Chapter 40 Summary
Ed has angina, and Vix flies to Santa Fe to be with him. Frankie is at the hospital, but Tawny stays in Key West. They’re not married anymore: He’s not her “responsibility.” Vix calls Lanie and speaks to her daughter, who calls Vix “Anti-Vix.” Lanie and her kids arrive, and the kids think Vix is wealthy, and they want her to buy them ponies. The son refers to Frankie as “the Cow.” Supposedly, Ed spends all his money on Frankie. Lanie works three jobs, but her husband doesn’t work. He yells at Lanie but not at the kids.
Ed calls Vix “dependable” and encourages her to contact Caitlin. At the grocery, Vix runs into Caitlin’s mom. Caitlin is back at the Vineyard, aiming for the “simple life.” She’s also having a daughter. Caitlin wonders if her campaign against an ordinary life has made her “neurotic.”
Part 4, Chapter 41 Summary
In June, Caitlin calls Vix at work. Caitlin is getting married, and the guy is Bru. Vix throws up, and her boss sends her home. Outside, the Bag Lady sticks her paper cup in Vix’s face, and Vix knocks it away. The Bag Lady calls Vix a “bitch.” Vix tells Maia and Paisley about the marriage, and Maia thinks Vix should get over Caitlin and Bru and not go. She’s not 13 anymore. Paisley disagrees: She thinks going will help her get over them. Vix goes, and Caitlin meets her at the airport. For a moment, it’s like they are still “summer sisters forever”(3).
Part 4 Analysis
The theme of fearing an average life begins in Chapter 3 when Vix and Caitlin agree to never be ordinary (NBO). In Part 4, after Caitlin expresses surprise that Vix didn’t marry Bru, Vix replies, “How could I? I signed the NBO, remember?” (293). Marriage thus becomes a symbol of an ordinary life. Conversely, marriage itself isn’t ordinary, but forcing a marriage is common. Vix tells Caitlin, “I said I wasn’t ready” (293). What makes Vix uncommon is she doesn’t pressure herself to set aside her feelings and marry Bru.
Maia tries to attach averageness to Caitlin when she tells Vix, “There’s a Caitlin in every junior high. You have to get over her and get on with your life” (295). In other words, she implies that “Caitlins” are a dime a dozen. Vix defends Caitlin’s singularity when she tells Maia, “Caitlin’s complicated.” Friends continue to symbolize support, and here, Vix stands up for Caitlin. At the same time, Maia and Paisley are her friends, and they support her, though they—mainly Maia—have doubts about Caitlin.
The theme of Innocence Versus Experience pivots as Caitlin and Vix learn that experience does not necessary lend ease to life. Caitlin says, “Sometimes, I wish we were twelve again” (291). It’s as if Caitlin has run out of experience. She has nothing left to accomplish, so she wants to start over and collect the experiences anew. Dinah also adds a topsy-turvy layer to innocence versus experience when she takes credit for Vix’s ideas, yells at her, and throws a paperweight at her when she quits. Vix wonders, “This was the professional world?” (306). Throughout the novel, adults regularly teach Vix and Caitlin that experience doesn’t mean that people act kindly or rationally. Here, experience only makes Dinah abusive.
The motif of money complicates Vix’s brief relationship with Will. In a sassy tone, she tells him, “[M]y sister’s on welfare and my brother enlisted on his eighteenth birthday […] I owe my benefactors everything. They invested in my future so I could hold my own with snobs like you” (322). Vix gets pleasure out of fulfilling Will’s stereotypical portrait of her background. However, her ownership of her socioeconomic origins contrasts with the way she is viewed by her family, who continue to think of her as a snob, with one of Lanie’s kids declaring, “Mommy says you’re rich. So how come you won’t buy us ponies?” (329). Vix remains an outcast in her family, but Ed subverts her estrangement when he states, “Vix is dependable. She’ll come if you need her” (330). Like solid friends, good family members are supportive.
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