The Tragically True Adventures of Kit Donovan by Patricia Bailey

Life in a mining town is never easy, but Kit has more to feel guilty about than most.  She got too busy watching the people in the dance hall and didn't get the doctor in time for her mother.  When she dies from her cold, Kit wishes she'd died instead.  As she and her father struggle on, he gets hurt in a mining accident.  She wants to tell everyone about the unsafe mining conditions, so she tells the newspaper reporter about it.  He prints it.  Then the mine owner kills her father.  Everyone said it was self-defense, but she knew it wasn't.  How can she prove that?

Albert Whitman and Company and Edelweiss gave me the opportunity to read this book for review (thank you).  It will be published April 25th.

Kit moves in with the next door widow lady, gets a job at the newspaper by pretending to be a boy, and starts trying to gather information.  The mine owner has almost everybody in town in his corner.  He buys loyalty.  But not everyone is sold on him.

Kit is determined to get at the truth and she will do anything necessary to ferret it out.  While she does all this, she grows up along the way.  The new friend she found is handsome and nice and she has a crush on him, so she's hurt when he likes someone else.

I enjoyed how Kit developed and how she accomplished her goal.  She also made friends along the way and has a new "family" that she has gathered together of all types of people.  I felt her sorrow and guilt and I also felt her jubilation at vindicating her father.  She walked a sad road but she came out happy at the end.  You'll even learn a bit about gold mining on the way.