THE NAME OF THE GAME WAS MURDER

A curmudgeonly author's luxurious, well-staffed island home- -fortuitously cut off by a storm that lasts long enough for teenage narrator Samantha to make her deductions and confront the murderer before the police can get there—is the setting for this classic tale of houseguests who all have motives for doing in their obnoxious host. The suspects (aging football hero, Hollywood star, romance writer, US senator, etc.) are strictly stock; their reactions to the game Augustus used to lure them for the weekend (if they solve his clues, he'll delete their terrible pasts from his latest manuscript) and to his death are pure fantasy, as is their dimwitted willingness to rely on Sam's help in finding the offending manuscript (they're less worried about who killed Augustus). But the clues (in several batches, individually addressed to everyone concerned)—and the way Sam, with lots of serendipity, puzzles through them—are clever indeed. An entertaining quick read. (Fiction. 10-16)