Imagine a family unknowingly moving into a dark and spooky abandoned manor infested with ghosts. Imagine a murder in a high school detention room, and four suspects. Imagine a new job opportunity in a town full of secrets. Do these things sound interesting? Do they send a chill up your spine? If so, these might be the perfect mystery books to read on a dark and stormy night.
This month’s column is all about mysteries, one of my favorite book genres. I love the suspenseful race of trying to figure out whodunit or what happened before the characters do. I love jaw dropping plot twists.
This issue of the Teen Pager features three of my favorite mystery books: "House of Ash and Bone" by Joel A. Sutherland, "All the Wrong Questions" by Lemony Snicket, and "One of Us Is Lying" by Karen M. McManus. While all of these books are mysteries, some are scarier than others.
For younger kids I would recommend "All the Wrong Questions," since the print is larger and the subject matter isn’t quite so mature. For kids that are more in the middle school age, "One of Us Is Lying" is a good choice. This book has some more mature themes in it. "House of Ash and Bone" is most likely the one you will find most gory and scary. Generally I would say 13-plus is a good age to read that book.
"All the Wrong Questions"
"All the Wrong Questions" is the supposed retelling of Lemony Snicket’s childhood. It can be assumed Lemony Snicket never actually did have a childhood like this, but it’s amusing to imagine. The series kicks off with Lemony Snicket, a 13-year-old boy, getting an apprenticeship with a detective. Lemony is very curious, which annoys his mentor, Theodora, to no end.
Lemony and Theodora travel to a little town called Stain’d by the Sea, where they investigate the mysterious disappearance of a statue made to look like the Bombinating Beast. The Bombinating Beast is a legendary creature that has the head of a seahorse and razor sharp teeth. The statue is about the size of a glass cup, and is owned by a nice old lady who makes cookies. She assumes the statue had been burgled, but Lemony isn’t so sure. Why would the burglar take that specific statue, and not the more valuable things lying around her house?
When in Stain’d by the Sea, Lemony befriends a young girl named Moxie Malllahan, who dreams of becoming a journalist. With her help, he works to put together the pieces of the missing statue case. This series focuses on all of the “wrong questions” Lemony asks when he’s solving mysteries. The first wrong question, “Who Could That Be at This Hour?” Is the title of this first book.
"One of Us Is Lying"
"One of Us Is Lying" is a murder mystery trilogy. This story focuses on the perspective of four different teenagers -- Cooper Clay, Addy Prentiss, Bronwyn Rojas, and Nate Macauley -- who all have one thing in common: They are suspects in the murder of Simon Kellher. After Simon dies in detention, their darkest secrets were plastered on Simon’s old gossip page, About That. This gives them all reasons to have killed Simon, and they become the prime suspects, nicknamed the “Bayview Four.”
Strangely, being sucked into a murder case helped some of the Bayview Four grow closer, close enough to infer none of them killed Simon. The real question is, who did? In this series, the characters go through everything from everyday teenage struggles, to police interrogating them, and getting death threats from people who are sure they killed Simon. Some themes of this book series are, investigation, secrets, and entitlement.
"House of Ash and Bone"
In "House of Ash and Bone," the protagonist is a girl named Josephine Jagger. Josephine has been able to hear other people's thoughts at random times since she was little, and she’s had to hide it all her life.
Josephine is taking a vacation to Vermont after Christmas with her family, but something about it seems off. When they first arrive, a strange man is standing in their yard. He won’t respond to anything, but suddenly he snaps out of it and introduces himself as the realtor. Once the family enters the house, everything seems almost too perfect. There are art supplies in her artsy younger sister's closet, a plethora of instruments in her other sister’s closet, and clothing in her oldest sister’s closet. When Josephine checks her closet, it is stuffed to the brim with books.
Every so often, Josephine seems to see a woman. The strange thing about this woman, she has no eyes, and she vanishes almost as quickly as she appears. Slowly but surely, she starts to show up in Josephine's dreams. With the help of a neighbor named Dorothy, Josephine discovers this woman is a ghost and her name is Dorcas. Suddenly it is apparent Dorcas is trying to sacrifice Josephine's family. It falls on Josephine to banish Dorcas from the house, before her family gets too comfortable and become pawns in Dorcas’s game.
These are great books for chilly fall nights, and I think you’ll enjoy them. If you have any suggestions for me to review in my next column, you can email me at [email protected]! Thank you for reading and I’ll see you next month!