These Shallow Graves by Jennifer Donnelly

by:  Jennifer Donnelly
published by:  Random House Delacourte
publish date:  October 10, 2015

Jo Montfort is beautiful and rich, and soon—like all the girls in her class—she’ll graduate from finishing school and be married off to a wealthy bachelor. Which is the last thing she wants. Jo secretly dreams of becoming a writer—a newspaper reporter like the trailblazing Nellie Bly.

Wild aspirations aside, Jo’s life seems perfect until tragedy strikes: her father is found dead.  The more Jo uncovers about her father’s death, the more her suspicions grow. There are too many secrets.  Then she meets Eddie—a young, brash, infuriatingly handsome reporter at her father’s newspaper—and it becomes all too clear how much she stands to lose if she keeps searching for the truth. Only now it might be too late to stop.

This book takes place at the end of the 19th century.  Jo is a girl from a privileged family.  She's going to finishing school, but she really wants to become a reporter.  However, her family would never allow this.  Then, her father dies under mysterious circumstances.  Jo doesn't accept what she is being told about his death and begins to investigate what happened.  She meets Eddie, a young reporter, who helps her along the way.  He helps her realize that there is a whole lot more to life than the pampered life she's been living.

I thought this was a pretty good YA mystery.  I liked the historical aspects of it.  It takes place in New York City at the end of the 19th century and I always like to read about that particular time in history.  I would recommend this one to the YA readers.  Especially fans of historical fiction and mysteries.