The Dysfunctional Family's Guide to Murder

By: Kate Emery

Narrated by: Siho Ellsmore

In this hilarious, contemporary YA whodunit, a mystery-loving teen finally gets a chance to solve a real-life crime. But solving a murder is complicated when all the prime suspects are related to you...

14-year-old Ruth was expecting a few fights on her family's vacation at their remote farmhouse. But she wasn't expecting a murder. And "death by typewriter" wasn't quite how she thought her step-grandmother, GG, would meet her end.

As an avid reader of mystery novels, Ruth is more than a little excited to have a real mystery to solve. (Though she's sad about GG. Obviously.) And she's read enough Agatha Christie that catching a killer should be a breeze... right?

With her annoyingly hot sort-of-cousin, Dylan, as the Watson to her Holmes, Ruth soon begins to uncover long-buried family secrets, finding that each of her relatives--her dad; her aunts and their partners; even, in the interest of fairness, Dylan and herself--had reasons to want GG gone.

But are any of them capable of murder? As tensions rise with everyone stuck in the house together, Ruth will have to dig deep to find out... before the killer strikes again.

Critic reviews

"Ruth, the first-person narrator, is fantastically smart, funny, and snarky." —Booklist

"A zany and entertaining whodunit." —Kirkus Reviews

"Ruth’s narration is clever and witty, her dysfunctional family’s banter is believable, and the dialogue-driven writing style makes the pages fly." —The Bulletin

"A laugh-out-loud funny whodunit that is a first purchase for mystery fans."—SLJ