The Westing Game  The Westing Game is a mystery book written by Ellen Raskin and published by Dutton in 1978. It won the Newbery Medal recognizing the year's most distinguished contribution to American children's literature. "The Westing Game" was ranked number one among all-time children's novels in a survey published by "School Library Journal" in 2012. It has been adapted as the 1997 feature film "Get a Clue" (also distributed as "The Westing Game"). Sunset Towers is a new apartment building on Lake Michigan, north of Milwaukee and just down the shore from the mansion owned by reclusive self-made millionaire Samuel W. Westing. (Despite its name, Sunset Towers faces east – into the sunrise.) Sam Westing was a wealthy businessman who made his fortune in paper products. He was very patriotic and never smoked, drank, or gambled. As the story opens, Barney Northrup is selling apartments to a carefully selected group of tenants. He claims that chess is not allowed in the building. After Sam Westing dies, at the beginning of the book, it emerges that most of the tenants are named as heirs in Westing's will. The will is structured like a puzzle, with the 16 heirs challenged to find the solution. Each of the eight pairs, assigned seemingly at random, is given $10,000 cash and a different set of baffling clues. The pair that solves the mystery will inherit Westing's entire $200 million fortune and control of his company. It is discovered that Berthe Erica Crow is the answer but not the murderer. In the end, unknown to the other players, Turtle Wexler wins the game and inherits Sam Westing's company. The epilogue of the story is told in the book's last three chapters, which depict what happened to the heirs after the game ended, and how it affected them. "The Westing Game", adapted by Darian Lindle and directed by Terry Brino-Dean, was first produced at Prime Stage Theatre in Pittsburgh in 2009. The script is published by Dramatic Publishing. "Get a Clue", adapted by Dylan Kelsey Hadley and directed by Terence H. Winkless was produced for television in 1997. At the time of the book's publication, "Kirkus Reviews" called it "A supersharp mystery, more a puzzle than a novel, but endowed with a vivid and extensive cast... If Raskin's crazy ingenuity has threatened to run away with her on previous occasions, here the complicated game is always perfectly meshed with character and story.