When you Reach Me

By Rebecca Stead

Stead, Rebecca. When you reach me. Wendy Lamb Books, 2009.

Summary: 

This book is set in NYC in the 1970s. Miranda and Sal walk home from school every day. Miranda’s mother has talked to her about being safe so she feels comfortable doing this even if there is strange homeless person living under the mailbox on her street. One day when Miranda and her best friend Sal were walking home from school, a boy that they didn’t know came out of nowhere and punched Sal in the stomach. After this happened, Sal stopped hanging out with Miranda and weird things begin to happen. Miranda starts getting strange notes, notes that she doesn’t understand nor does she know who was giving them to her. The more notes she gets, she becomes more and more confused. Some of the information in the notes hadn’t even happened yet. Miranda is determined to figure out the mystery behind the notes.


Lexile Level: 750L
Grades: 4 and up
Domain: Affective

Standards
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.4.1
Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.4.2
Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details; summarize the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.4.3
Explain events, procedures, ideas, or concepts in a historical, scientific, or technical text, including what happened and why, based on specific information in the text.

Goal

Students will be able to predict the outcome of a story by analyzing clues.

Objective

Using a pre-writing worksheet, students will identify and write down two mysteries from When You Reach.
Using a pre-writing worksheet, students will identify and write down two clues that they find in the book that could assist them in making predictions

Outcome
Students will write a short mystery story that includes clues a reader could use to try and predict or solve the mystery.
Students will read one of their classmates story and try to solve the mystery.

Book Review:

I really enjoyed this book. I feel that the characters were well developed. I liked the way the author gave us the background information about the main character, her back story per say. There are many times where an author attempts to explain the history of the characters but it ends up being awkward, it just doesn’t flow with the story. I thought the way the author provided the information seemed natural and an organic part of the story. I love books with a twist that you didn’t see coming. I never suspected the laughing man was the future Marcus. I knew he had to be part of the story in some way but I couldn’t figure it out. I still wonder why he ended up being a homeless person. What happened to him to lead to this? If he went back to the future to save Sal, then I would think he would know when Sal was going to be in trouble and could show up then. He won’t have to be living in the streets waiting for a random time. I am still processing the ending. So did Sal die in future so Marcus decides to build the time machine to save Sal based on what Miranda says in the letter she writes him? But if Marcus did build a time machine and saved Sal, than Sal would be alive in the future so there would have been no need to build the time machine. So many questions but that, to me, makes a book. A good book stays with you long after you finish it. If a book makes you think and ask questions than the author did their job.

There were many times during the book that the author used foreshadowing. First, she stated at one point, that the story all started the day Sal got punched. Miranda’s favorite book is A Wrinkle in Time, Miranda was getting anonymous notes, Marcus and Miranda talk about time travel. The origin of the laughing man was vague which made me wonder what his role was going to be in the story.

The popular culture references the author uses, such as the 20,000 Pyramid, helped me to visualize the story. The clothes that Miranda’s mother wears are definitely clothes that were in style in the 70s. I don’t know if a kid reading this book today would be able to picture the story taking place in the 70s. I don’t know what else the author could have done to achieve this though. I was able to picture in my head some different scenes but I won’t have immediately associated them with life in the 1970s without the popular culture references.

I would classify When you Reach Me as science fiction. It is set in the real world but it asks the question, what if time travel was possible?

I think kids would enjoy reading this book if they give it a chance. But it does seem like fantasy books are quite popular so it might be a hard sell. Given that, a hook I would use would be to ask questions that appeal to their sense of curiosity. “What would you do if you could change the future? How do you right a wrong?”

Read Alikes

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg

Konigsburg, E. L. From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1967

Nate the Great series by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat

Sharmat, Marjorie Weinman. 1972-2015, Nate the Great, book series, Random House, New York.


I don’t know the Nate the Great series would be too young for the age group I had in mind, fourth grade, but the series might be good for struggling readers.