Just Like You Said

A friend of mine answered the door the other day holding a book. She said she had been going down a list of Newbery winners and couldn't stop reading this one.


When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead is narrated by a young girl named Miranda. She loves A Wrinkle in Time and hates when her mother wears striped tights. Her best friend Sal seems more interested in basketball than walking home with her; her new friend Annemarie has a crush on the boy she likes. Living in New York City, she braces herself every afternoon for the walk home which takes her by a rowdy group of boys and a mumbling homeless man she calls "the laughing man." One day she comes home to an unlocked apartment and a mysterious note tucked into her library book. Later, she finds another note which outlines three dates that prove the note writer is a time-traveler.

Time travel, L'Engle, The $20,000 Pyramid, and 1979 New York meant I couldn't put it down. The second time either.