The Westing Game

The Westing Game is a 1978 mystery novel by American children’s author and illustrator Ellen Raskin. The novel, marketed as children’s literature, won the John Newbery Medal, although it is also considered a work of young adult fiction. The narrative tells the story of a group of strangers brought together to solve the mystery of wealthy industrialist Samuel Westing’s death and pursue a great fortune. As the mystery unfolds, the story considers themes like Appearances as a (Non)Indication of the Self, Greed and Charity as Motivators, and The Use of Rationality to Explain an Irrational World.

Content Warning: The source material contains depictions of racism and ableism, as well as references to suicide and alcohol addiction.

Plot Summary

At the opening of the book, mysterious letters land on the doorstep of a special group of individuals, inviting them to come see a new luxury apartment building called Sunset Towers on the shores of Lake Michigan. The new residents include Dr. and Mrs. Wexler and their two daughters, a dressmaker named Flora Baumbach, the Theodorakises and their two sons, secretary Sydelle Pulaski, judge J. J. Ford, and James Hoo and his wife and son. 

The Hoos and Theodorakises also run businesses in the building (a restaurant and coffee shop, respectively), while Dr. Wexler practices from the building’s office suite. A cleaning woman (Berthe Crow), a deliveryman (Otis Amber), and a doorman (Alexander McSouthers) live in the building as well. Sunset Towers itself is located near the mansion of a paper magnate named Sam Westing.

On Halloween night, Turtle, the Wexlers’ younger daughter, takes a bet to enter the old Westing mansion. She runs out screaming, believing she’s encountered the corpse of Westing. The following morning, his obituary appears in the newspaper.

The residents (minus the Theodorakis parents but plus a young doctor named Denton Deere, who is engaged to the Wexlers’ older daughter, Angela) then receive letters informing them that they are all heirs to the Wexler fortune. Upon first meeting later that night, they are surprised to learn that a lawyer has summoned all 16 of them to hear the reading of the will.

The will appears to reveal that Westing was murdered. It also groups the heirs into eight seemingly random pairs that are each issued a set of clues, a $10,000 check, and a challenge to solve Westing’s murder. The winning team will win Westing’s $200 million fortune as well as control of his company.

A snowstorm confines the heirs to the building for several days, during which time they get to know each other. Some believe that sharing clues is the only way to solve the puzzle, while others are more territorial, wanting to know more about their opponents.

Judge J. J. Ford believes that Westing is trying to frame someone to settle an old score; to learn more about the other heirs, she throws a party in her apartment. The next morning, they all convene in the coffee shop on the first floor to strategize, but a bomb goes off, cutting the meeting short. Although the explosion injures no one, paranoia sets in. Another bomb explodes days later, this time in the Chinese restaurant on the top floor, and Sydelle goes to the hospital with minor injuries. 

As the snow finally clears, the heirs are free to resume their uninhibited investigations. Judge Ford and her partner, Sandy McSouthers, discover that Westing’s daughter died by suicide years ago after being forced to pursue marriage with a man she did not love.

A third explosion sends Angela to the hospital with facial injuries, but Turtle soon deduces that Angela arranged the bombings herself—presumably to avoid marrying Denton without first pursuing her own dreams.

When the heirs are at last called back to the Westing mansion to give their answers, only Ford has deduced that Crow is the supposed culprit; Crow was once married to Westing, and (Ford believes) Westing blames her for their daughter’s death and is therefore trying to frame her for his own “murder.” For this reason, Ford declines to give an answer, while everyone else gives various incorrect answers.

The heirs are then told they have a limited amount of time to solve the case before the authorities arrive. Sandy abruptly dies, and his body is removed, but the game continues. Upon combining their clues, the heirs discover the words “Berthe Erica Crow” but decline to hand her over to the police. However, Crow herself volunteers to go.

A makeshift court is set up following Crow’s removal. A thorough cross-examination, performed by Turtle and overseen by Judge Ford, pieces together information crucial to discovering that Westing was not killed. He in fact had several personas. He was Sandy, and he was also the man who signed the original tenant letters and welcomed the families to Sunset Towers—Barney Northrup.

Crow returns from jail, and the heirs understand that no one is to win the big fortune. Turtle, however, cracks the puzzle and discovers Westing’s fourth and final identity: Julian Eastman. Sam Westing, Sandy McSouthers, Barney Northrup, and Julian Eastman are all the same man, who is not dead after all—Sandy’s death too was staged. She goes to Eastman the next morning and wins the game, but she keeps her prize a secret. When Westing truly dies many years later, she is poised to take over the business. Before this, however, she sits at his bedside, filling him in on how the lives of the game’s participants have changed over the years. She then goes to play chess—one of Westing’s favorite pastimes—with her niece.