The Green Jade Necklace by Josephine Chase

In The Green Jade Necklace, Leslie Page has been recently orphaned.  She must earn her living, and she finally gets work at a newspaper.  Leslie's boss requests that she go undercover at a friend's party so that she can find out about the valuable green jade necklace whose previous owners have been murdered.  Leslie is supposed to seek information that will hopefully prevent the current owner from being murdered.  Instead, Leslie uncovers a plot to steal the valuable necklace, and she must try to prevent the theft.

Leslie is 16 years old.

I commented in my previous post that I do believe that Josephine Chase did actually write this book, published in 1931.  She died in 1931.  The word "toppo" appears on page 14.  I recall this odd word being used in the Marjorie Dean series. 

I purchased this book around 10 to 15 years ago after hearing that Josephine Chase's Detective Stories for Girls are well worth reading.  I did not get around to reading it until 2017.  I enjoyed it and knew that I needed to find the other four books.  I regretted that I waited so long to read it, since building the set was quite difficult and I must have missed many buying opportunities over those many years.

From page 22:

As a child [Leslie] had turned impatiently aside from the pleasant conventional books for girls, to revel instead in the stir and thrill of adventure stories.

I agree with that.  Conventional books for girls from the early part of the 20th century can be a bit dull at times.  Ironically, Josephine Chase's books for girls, such as the Grace Harlowe books, fall into that category.

This is a very good book.