As a boy, Mark Oppenheimer loved reading — and re-reading — books written by Judy Blume. While his friends were interested in sci-fi, fantasy, and sports biographies, Oppenheimer was drawn to “Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret,” “Then Again, Maybe I Won’t,” “Blubber,” and other Blume novels for middle-grade students and young adults.

“What I liked about Judy Blume’s books was that they seemed possible, that they were realistic books with kids who were recognizable to me, and who were doing things that were recognizable to me. There didn’t seem to be a lot of books like this for young people at the time,” said Oppenheimer.

Fast forward nearly half a century, and kids are still voraciously reading these modern classics, and Oppenheimer, now 51, has written an engrossing biography of his favorite childhood author. Published March 10, “Judy Blume: A Life” is an illuminating deep dive into how Blume went from a creatively unfulfilled 1960s stay-at-home New Jersey mom to the author of 29 books for children, teens, and adults, that have sold 92 million copies in 40 languages. She is also a long-time vocal anti-censorship activist.

Journalist and author Oppenheimer told The Times of Israel that, despite being a huge Blume fan growing up, he would not have ventured to write this book without at least some participation from Blume herself.

“Certainly, one could write a book about anybody by writing around them. And there was so much in the public record about Judy Blume that one could write a plausible biography just based on what’s already publicly known,” Oppenheimer said.

“But I think it would have been a very impoverished book had I not been able to interview her and her husband and children. I had no plans to try to write this book until I knew that she would at least grant me interviews,” he said.

Fortunately, Blume had seen an article Oppenheimer published in The New York Times Book Review in 1997, when he was in his early 20s. It was a tribute to Blume’s writing and the popularity of her books despite uneven acclaim from — and even censorship by — educators, librarians, and parents. Kids, on the other hand, recognized the value of her characters facing concerns and challenges similar to those of real-life young people: Puberty and sex, divorce, sibling rivalry, bullying, race, class, and religion. Young readers didn’t need adults to recommend Blume’s books to them — friends and classmates did.

Blume, now 88, reached out to Oppenheimer after reading the piece, and the two stayed loosely in touch after that. More than a decade ago, Oppenheimer broached the idea of a biography with Blume, but she said she was not interested — at least not at that point.

Then, in 2022, as Oppenheimer was promoting his book “Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood“........

© The Times of Israel