"I never liked history. And now I knew why. It's all about dead people."

In Joanne Dahme's new novel, Tombstone Tea, Jessie has just moved to a new school in Philadelphia, near the Schuylkill River. Laurel Hill Charter School is named after and affiliated with the cemetery that has become a sculpture garden and park over the years. When Jessie accepts a dare to spend the night in the cemetery to become friends with girls in her new school, she meets Paul, a worker in the graveyard. He becomes her tour guide that first night and protects her from the "actors" that he claims are recreating the Tombstone Tea of years ago. When the actors turn out to not be what Jessie expects, she is confronted with new knowledge of her own abilities and a history lesson that is more alive than dead.

For the majority of the book, Jessie is our narrator. And while it is an interesting story, we learn more about the cemetery and its inhabitants then we ever really do about Jessie. We learn the most about Paul, and the most angry of the cemetery dwellers, Amy and her mother, Jenny.

This book is due to be released in September 2009.