Today's post is on The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin. It is 182 pages long and is published by Puffin Books. The cover is black with a house, in the center, made of money and fireworks going off behind it. The intended reader is someone who likes mysteries. The story is told from third person close of the characters. There Be Spoilers Ahead.
From the back of the book- A bizarre chain of events begins when sixteen unlikely people gather for the reading of Samuel W. Westing's will. And though no one knows why the eccentric, game-loving millionaire has a chosen a virtual stranger- and a possible murderer- to inherit his vast fortune, one things' for sure: Sam Westing may be dead.. but that won't stop him from playing one last game!
Review- This is a very slow whodunit story. Sixteen very different people are invited to come and hear Sam Westing's will and discover that they are his heirs but one of them killed Sam Westing. The plot sounds interesting but it is so slow and the characters never really seem to take off, so that I struggled to read and engage with this book. I pushed on through but I'm not sure that I really enjoyed it. I like to have strong, interesting characters but none of the characters in this book fit this. They are there and they do things like try and discover who killed Sam Westing but they are two dimensional and just a little boring. The plot has lots of twists and could be really engaging but it just falls flat because of the lack of characters. It is considered a classic so that is your thing, then give this a try but if you want a character driven Clue-esque mystery then try something else.
I give this book a Two out of Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I borrowed this book from my local library.
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