Author Guide · Biography & Media History
Books Written by
Brooke Kroeger spent eleven years at United Press International, reporting from Chicago, Brussels, London and Tel Aviv, where she ran the bureau, before she wrote a single book. For her first, a life of Nellie Bly, she says she worked “three years, literally day and night, seven days a week”, through archives from Pittsburgh to Vienna. Since then she has kept returning to people the record let slip: a best-selling novelist nobody reads any more, the men who marched for women’s votes, two centuries of women in American newsrooms. She taught journalism at New York University from 1998 to 2021 and is now professor emerita. This guide covers her six key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 6 key books · 1994–2023 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Brooke Kroeger has written six books. The best known are Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist (1994), named an NPR Best Book of the Year, and Undaunted: How Women Changed American Journalism (2023). In between came Fannie (1999), Passing (2003), Undercover Reporting (2012) and The Suffragents (2017). Start with Nellie Bly: it is the book the rest of her work grows out of.
Where to Start with Brooke Kroeger
If you want her defining book
→ Nellie Bly (1994) — the first full biography of Nellie Bly.
If you want the big picture
→ Undaunted (2023) — women in American journalism from the 1840s to now.
If you want a history almost nobody knows
→ The Suffragents (2017) — the men who campaigned for women’s votes.
If you want the ethics of reporting
→ Undercover Reporting (2012) — when, if ever, a journalist may deceive.
6 Brooke Kroeger Books, in Order
Nellie Bly
The first full biography of Nellie Bly, the reporter who feigned insanity in 1887 to expose a New York asylum and raced around the world in 72 days in 1889–90. Kroeger follows her past the famous stunts into her later life running an industrial company, using letters, court files and census records from archives in the United States and Austria. Published by Times Books and named an NPR Best Book of the Year.
Fannie
A life of Fannie Hurst (1885–1968), one of the best-selling American writers of the 1920s and 1930s, whose novels Back Street (1931) and Imitation of Life (1933) were each filmed more than once. Kroeger covers her fame, her unconventional marriage to the pianist Jacques Danielson, and her friendship with Zora Neale Hurston. The New York Times reviewed it in September 1999; the St. Louis Post-Dispatch named it a best book of the year.
Passing
Six present-day people who lived as something other than what they were taken to be: a light-skinned Black man passing as a white Jew, a gay rabbinical student and a lesbian naval officer passing as straight, a Puerto Rican woman hiding her working-class background, a white teacher passing as Black, and a poet who invented a persona to write about rock music. Kroeger asks what each gained and what it cost. Published by PublicAffairs.
Undercover Reporting
A history of undercover journalism, from a New York Tribune reporter in the pre-Civil War South and Nellie Bly’s asylum exposé to Gloria Steinem as a Playboy bunny, the Chicago Sun-Times “Mirage” tavern (1978) and ABC’s Food Lion case (1992). Kroeger argues the method is more common and more honourable than its reputation. Published by Northwestern University Press, with a companion online database built with NYU Libraries.
The Suffragents
The story of the Men’s League for Woman Suffrage, which grew from 150 founding members in 1909 to thousands across 35 states by 1917, with Oswald Garrison Villard, John Dewey, Max Eastman and Rabbi Stephen S. Wise among its prominent men. They marched, lobbied and took the heckling. Published by Excelsior Editions (SUNY Press); gold medal for US history at the 2018 Independent Publisher Book Awards and a finalist for the Lasky Prize.
Undaunted
A history of American women journalists from the 1840s to the present, and of their long fight for equal standing in the most competitive parts of the profession, with figures from Nellie Bly and Ida B. Wells to Martha Gellhorn and Joan Didion alongside many forgotten names. Published by Knopf in May 2023 (592 pages), it received a starred Kirkus review and was reviewed in The New York Times and The Guardian.
In What Order to Read Brooke Kroeger
None of her books depends on another, so you can pick by subject. Read in publication order, though, they show one line of work: two biographies of women who were famous in their day, then a widening lens on identity, on reporting methods, on the suffrage campaign, and finally on two centuries of women in the press.
Nellie Bly and Undercover Reporting pair naturally, since Bly’s asylum story is where the second book starts. The Suffragents and the essay collection Front Pages, Front Lines (2020) are the groundwork for Undaunted.
A reading path
1. Nellie Bly (1994)
2. Undercover Reporting (2012)
3. The Suffragents (2017)
4. Undaunted (2023)
Everything Else Brooke Kroeger Published
Beyond the 6 key books: 2 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Edited and short works
2
2 books · 2020–2024
- 2020Front Pages, Front Lines: Media and the Fight for Women’s Suffrageessays co-edited with Linda Steiner and Carolyn Kitch, University of Illinois Press
- 2024A Journalist at Wara short Thornwillow Press dispatch on Ann Stringer, United Press reporter in the Second World War
The years · 1949–2023
Quick facts about Brooke Kroeger
- Known for
- Recovering women, and some men, whom American media history had forgotten, starting with the first full biography of Nellie Bly
- 1949
- Born in the United States
- 1973
- Joins UPI as a reporter in Chicago
- 1994
- Nellie Bly
- 2005
- Founding director of NYU’s Carter Journalism Institute
- 2023
- Undaunted
- Born
- 1949
- Education
- Boston University (BS, 1971); Columbia University (MS in journalism, 1972)
- Reporting
- United Press International, 1973–1984, including Tel Aviv bureau chief; Newsday, 1984–1987
- Teaching
- New York University, 1998–2021; now professor emerita
- Honours
- Nellie Bly: NPR Best Book of the Year (1994); The Suffragents: IPPY gold medal, US history (2018)
- Books
- Six, from 1994 to 2023, plus one co-edited collection
The red mark is 1994: Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist, her first book.
How Brooke Kroeger Writes: A Reporter in the Archive
Kroeger researches a biography the way a wire reporter works a story: exhaustively, and from the documents. For Nellie Bly she went through letters and court records at the Carnegie Library in Pittsburgh, Smith College, Syracuse, the US National Archives and the state archive in Vienna, plus census records, city directories and microfilm of the New York World. She has said she meant the book as “an archive for future researchers, a road map”.
Her subjects are chosen for what history dropped. Fannie Hurst was one of the best-paid writers in America and is now barely read; the Men’s League for Woman Suffrage had thousands of members and is almost absent from suffrage histories. She tells these stories plainly, with dates and names, and lets the evidence carry the argument rather than her own voice.
When she argues, she argues openly. Undercover Reporting defends deception as a legitimate reporting tool, and critics such as Jack Shafer in the Columbia Journalism Review pushed back that her definition was too broad. For writers who dig through the record the same way, see Authors like Brooke Kroeger.
Watch
Brooke Kroeger on Undaunted
Kroeger talks with the journalist David Alpern about Undaunted at Rogers Memorial Library in Southampton, New York, on 8 November 2023.
Frequently asked questions about Brooke Kroeger’s books
Who is Brooke Kroeger?
An American journalist, author and professor emerita at New York University. She reported for United Press International for eleven years and then for Newsday, taught at NYU from 1998 to 2021, and was the founding director of its Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute.
How many books has Brooke Kroeger written?
Six, from Nellie Bly (1994) to Undaunted (2023). She also co-edited the essay collection Front Pages, Front Lines (2020) and wrote a short Thornwillow Press dispatch, A Journalist at War (2024).
What are Brooke Kroeger’s books in order?
Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist (1994), Fannie: The Talent for Success of Writer Fannie Hurst (1999), Passing: When People Can’t Be Who They Are (2003), Undercover Reporting: The Truth About Deception (2012), The Suffragents: How Women Used Men to Get the Vote (2017) and Undaunted: How Women Changed American Journalism (2023).
Where should I start with Brooke Kroeger?
With Nellie Bly (1994), her first book and the one her later work keeps returning to. If you want the broad story instead of one life, start with Undaunted (2023).
What is Brooke Kroeger’s most famous book?
Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist (1994), the first full biography of the pioneering reporter, named an NPR Best Book of the Year. Undaunted (2023), her broadest book, is the best known of her recent work.
What is Brooke Kroeger’s most recent book?
Undaunted: How Women Changed American Journalism, published by Knopf in May 2023. It traces American women journalists from the 1840s to the present.
What is The Suffragents about?
The Men’s League for Woman Suffrage, founded in 1909 with 150 members and grown to thousands across 35 states by 1917, and how suffrage leaders used these men’s influence to help win the vote. It won a gold medal for US history at the 2018 Independent Publisher Book Awards.
What is Brooke Kroeger’s book Passing about?
Passing: When People Can’t Be Who They Are (2003) follows six people who lived as something other than what they were taken to be, across race, class, religion and sexuality, and asks what passing gave and cost each of them.
Did Brooke Kroeger write about Nellie Bly more than once?
Yes. Bly is the subject of her first book (1994), and her asylum exposé is a starting point for Undercover Reporting (2012). She also appears in Undaunted (2023).
Is Brooke Kroeger still writing?
Yes. After Undaunted (2023) she wrote A Journalist at War, a Thornwillow Press dispatch on the Second World War reporter Ann Stringer, first published in April 2024, and she continues to give talks on women in journalism.
Footnotes
- Brooke Kroeger — Wikipedia
- Brooke Kroeger — NYU Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute
- Q&A on researching Nellie Bly — Historiography in Mass Communication, 2023
- The lying game — Columbia Journalism Review, 2012
- The Suffragents — Foreword Reviews
- Front Pages, Front Lines — University of Illinois Press
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“Leave no stone unturned. Be fierce in your determination to find the unfindable.”
— Brooke Kroeger, Q&A on researching Nellie Bly, Historiography in Mass Communication (2023)
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