I just had to share a wonderfully fun program I had at my library this past
Monday. It was called Clue in the Library Mystery Dinner Party.
I created a game based on the Clue board game. I came up with 10 suspects, 6
methods of murder, 10 "rooms" (areas of the library), & 8 motives. The
victim was "librarian" Novella Reads. Novella is the name of our library's
mannequin. (Our PR person found her in a dumpster in back of a local plaza a
couple years ago. novella is used for book displays. We dress her in a
wedding gown in June and set up wedding ettiquette books, in a dress & apron
for cookbooks, etc.) She's actually pretty hideous looking, and most of us
at the library hate her. EVERYONE begged to be the one who killed her.
Anyway, back to Clue. There were five teams (Plum, Scarlet, Peacock,
Mustard, Green). The kids signed their names on cooresponding color paper
badges that had a hole punched in them and had yarn threaded through the
holes to wear as a necklace.
I selected one of each of the card varieties in advance. Each team was given
a "Detectives Notebook" that had a spreadsheet of all the possibilities, An
assignment to interrogate two suspects, and a packet of the playing cards so
that they were interrogating two suspects whose cards they did not have (I
set this all up in advance. The game was rigged. I knew the solution, as
did the "murderer.").
So, off the kids went to find and interrogate their suspect. They were
allowed to ask three questions:
1. Have you heard that Novella Reads has been killed?
2. What was your opinion of Novella?
3. Where have you been for the past two hours? (went to opportunity)
If they tried to ask other questions, the suspects would refuse to answer
unless their attorney was present. EVERYONE had a motive for wanting Novella
dead. Some of the 8 possible motives were shared by more than one suspect.
Clues were on hand during the interrogations. For example, our library
secretary (Kathy) hated her because Novella was always foisting her work off
on Kathy and then taking all the credit. As she was being questioned, Kathy
was stapling like mad with this HUGE stapler from tech services. One of the
methods was "Stapled to Death." The kids had to take notes of the clues in
the answers, observations of the props the suspects had, etc.
Dinner was served during the "guessing" time. We had pizza and sandwiches I
made out of long french bread, lunch meat & cheese with mayo and cans of pop.
At the end, two of our town's police officers went and got the suspect (a
circulation associate). She was formally accused by the winning team. She
broke down and admitted that she just couldn't take it anymore--that Novella
was driving her nuts because she never paid her fines or returned her books
on time, so she smothered her with a pile of magazines in the book-sorting
room. The officers cuffed her and took her out. At the door, she turned and
warned the kids, "See--if you don't return your library books on time, you
may end up like Novella Reads!"
It was hysterical. The kids (grades 6 to 9) and the staff loved it. They
all really got into their roles and are still talking about it.
Dawn Sardes
YA Librarian
Euclid Public Library
Euclid, OH
Dmsardes@aol.com
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