Bundle · Large print

Mysteries, Season One

In each case a town signs a ledger of 2,000 names, something goes missing, and 12 or 13 clues strike out every name but one.

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Instant PDF download on Etsy. You print it at home; nothing is mailed.

Players: 1 to 6; a Team Sheet in every case for groups
Time: about an hour per case at a table of four; 2 hours or more alone
You need: pencils and a ruler; no scissors, no app, no host
Print: US Letter and A4; black ink is enough
Print size: Standard ledger 10 pt; Large Print edition 16 pt

At the table

You open Case File No. 1 and read the first clue aloud: “The culprit sat at table 14 or lower.” Pencils move down the ledger. An hour later one name is left, and next week there is another case on the table.

The three cases

Cases 1 and 2 share a town and its witnesses. No violence anywhere: a recipe box, a star, a silent bell.

No. 1, The Potluck Ledger: Maplewood, October 1958. Ida Prentiss’s recipe box vanishes from the Harvest Supper. 12 clues.
No. 2, The Christmas Star: Maplewood, Christmas Eve 1958. The carved star is gone from the tree when the lights come up. 13 clues.
No. 3, The Lighthouse Visitors’ Book: Port Alder, Harbor Day 1959. The fog bell’s iron clapper walks down 112 steps. 12 clues.

How the clues work

Each clue rules people out, never in. “The culprit sat at table 14 or lower”: strike out everyone at table 15 and up. “The culprit’s first name contains the letter A”: Clara stays, Rose is struck out. Every reading rule (strictly fewer, through, double letter, share a letter) is spelled out on each How to Play page with an example, so there is nothing to argue about at the table.

What you get5 files

Three case zips, one per casesix Player Packs each (Standard 2,000 names; Large Print 800 names at 16 pt with its own clue chain; Quick Case 800 names at 10 pt; all in Letter and A4). Standard editions run 51 pages each in Letter.
Start Here PDFwhat is in the box, the season rules, and the Season One certificate with the rank earned after the third case.

Case File No. 1
Case File No. 2
Case File No. 3

Why it works

In every case exactly one name survives all the clues: each chain was checked by program twice, the second time on the finished PDF. Leave any one clue out and two or more names survive, so there is no guessing and no dead end. A count line is printed on every ledger page (“Check: clue 1 leaves 31 of the 48 names on this page”), and each Detective’s Log has check-points every three clues, so a missed name shows up at once, without seeing the answer. And in every case the answer has been hiding in plain sight since page two; the Solution Pack says where.

Made for: Puzzle evenings, book clubs, church fellowship hours, family tables and anyone who wants three evenings of this instead of one.