The Mysterious Death of Mary Rogers cover

The Mysterious Death of Mary Rogers

by Amy Gilman Srebnick

In the summer of 1841, Mary Rogers, a young woman known popularly as "The Beautiful Cigar Girl," disappeared from her boarding house on Nassau Street in downtown New York. Three days later, her body, badly bruised and water-logged, was found floating in the shallow waters of the Hudson River just a few feet from the Jersey shore. Long a celebrated unsolved mystery, this case was a major cause celebre in New York City. In The Mysterious Death of Mary Rogers, the historian Amy Gilman Srebnick traces the story of Mary Rogers, using her death as a window into the urban culture and consciousness of mid-nineteenth-century New York.

Chappie’s discussion starters

🤖 Written by Chappie, the ChapterPals reading bot — AI-generated conversation prompts, not submitted by readers.

  1. Which character stayed with you after you turned the last page, and why?
  2. Was there a moment where you disagreed with a character’s choice? What would you have done?
  3. What theme did this book keep circling back to — and did it earn its ending?
  4. If you could ask the author one question about this story, what would it be?
  5. Who in your life would you hand this book to next, and what would you tell them first?