"When you reach me" has many conflicts. Some are major, some not so major. I think that during the rising action and climax of the book is when all of the problems started coming up. The book is written in a weird way. It's a letter to someone, but we don't find out who the letter is for and why Miranda is writing the letter until the end. This book touches on so many issues. Some issues that occur in the book are death, friendship, fighting, stealing, and a lot more. This book seems like a bearing witness book since it talks about issues and tries to bring light and show the importance of those issues.
One of the important issues are death. At the end of the book, a man who was homeless and lived on the street corner where Miranda's house was died. The Laughing Man is hat everyone would call him. Everyone would fear him, but really, there was nothing to fear. In the end, the Laughing Man risks his life to save Miranda's friend, Sal who was about to get hit by a truck. Instead, the laughing man pushed Sal out of the way and he got hit and died. In the book this part of the book shows how the laughing man took his life to save another. "Sal is going to die. Suddenly, the laughing man was in the street, his right leg flying out in a mighty kick. The laughing man's foot hit Sal's body. Sal flew backward and hit the ground, hard. The truck hit the laughing man." I think that that section of the book had a lot of emotion and feeling. The laughing man, who everyone wanted to stay away from, was actually a good person. He did what many people wouldn't, he risked his life to save another person that he didn't even know. I believe that everyone judged the laughing man and didn't give him a chance to see what a good person he really actually was. I think death is a major issue in the book.
Another major issue in the book is friendship. Miranda and Sal were great friends at first, but then Sal just stopped talking to her. They slowly grew apart and Miranda tried to work it out, but Sal just tried to avoid her. Miranda really wanted to befriends with Sal, but he kept pushing her away and making excuses why he couldn't hang out with her. In the book, it says "So do you remember why you don't like me anymore?" Miranda asked Sal that because she wanted their friendship to continue and be as it used to. Sal was not being a good friend to Miranda. Miranda made new friends, but she always thought about Sal no matter what.
An issue in the book is fighting. At the beginning of the book Sal was punched by a kid he did not even know. That kid was Marcus. After Sal was hit was when he started to separate himself from Miranda. In the book it says, "He made a fist that came up like a wave and hit Sal right n the stomach. Hard." Marcus, who hit Sal didn't do it on purpose he just wanted to see what Sal would do. That wasn't the right thing of Marcus to do because he was bullying Sal.
The fourth issue was stealing. One incident was when Miranda went home and found her apartment door open. She knew something was wrong, someone had been in there. All they stole was 1 shoe, but they still stole. Another incident was when Annabelle, Miranda, and Collin were at Jimmy's and Collin stole rolls from Jimmy's shop. Although that issue wasn't as big as the others the author still incorporated it for a reason.
In conclusion, I thought the author talked about all those issues to bear witness on them. I think that she talked about them for a reason, she wanted readers to become more aware of those issues. I believe that those issues affected the characters. The issues made the characters change and experience new things. I think that the author wanted to teach the readers the importance of the issues talked about.
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