The Story Pirates Present

by STORY PIRATES

  2.

  Around the time the candy disappeared, the cashier saw someone with an extremely shiny smile.

  Something was stuck to my shoe. It looked like a long piece of string, but it smelled minty.

  Through the wall, I could hear the sound of a very tiny drill.

  Did you get it? Here’s an even harder one:

  3.

  The floor was scuffed up with tread marks from a tire.

  The refrigerator was on top of the car. Who would have been strong enough to lift that?

  The note simply read: “01101000 01101001.”

  The answers are on this page.

  Try this out for yourself! Before you write a whole story, imagine a few different culprits and come up with clues about them. Try out the clues on your friends and family to see if they can guess the answer. This will be good practice for when you put clues in your own mystery.

  IDEA STORM: PLAN THE INVESTIGATION

  Draw up your own version of the Investigation Record, and start planning what clues you want your detective to find. The best place to start getting ideas for clues is the Culprit Case File (see pages 220–221). Look at the RIDICULOUS number of details to help you decide what kind of clues your culprit would leave behind.

  How does the detective find all these clues? The clues are probably not all just sitting together on a table, waiting for the detective to find them, after all. As you keep reading, we’re going to give you lots of ideas for how a detective tracks down the clues they need, and you’ll end up with many options to choose from. For now, just think about the clues themselves, and write down the ones you want your detective to find. We’ll help you with the rest as we keep going.

  If you got here by flipping forward from this page, flip back and keep reading!

  * * *

  DETECTIVE’S NOTEBOOK: SNOOPING AROUND

  There are lots of different ways for a detective to look for clues, but let’s start with a simple, old-fashioned one: snooping around.

  This is the easiest thing for a detective to do, really. Is there a part of the setting they haven’t visited yet? Maybe there’s a place they’ve been told not to go, or a place that is supposed to be private. If the setting is an amusement park, does the detective try to look around in the Ferris wheel control booth? If the story takes place in a school, does a kid detective sneak into the teacher’s lounge when nobody is looking?

  In Eliza’s case, she thinks there’s something weird going on in the basement and wants to find out more. She already went down there once, during the day, but she got caught. (That happens to detectives a lot when they’re snooping around!) So now she’s headed back at night, when she thinks everyone will be safely asleep.

  If you just read Chapter 8, you know what happened next. Let’s point out two very important things that Eliza found:

  An unexpected secret. Eliza was going down in the basement to look for ghosts, but instead she found…plants. Secret plants. Dangerous plants. What is Mr. Carroll up to? When you go snooping around, you don’t always find what you expect to find. Sometimes you dig up a new secret you didn’t even suspect was there (even if the writer had a secret planned for their setting all along). This secret doesn’t even have to be a clue in the mystery…though in Eliza’s case, it probably is.

  A clue about the culprit. Besides discovering what was in the basement, Eliza found another clue: the ghost, or whatever it is that’s haunting this store, has “a pair of blazing yellow eyes.” Eliza’s snooping around paid off! She found a new clue that may turn out to be very important.

  Also, the moment when Eliza saw the yellow eyes was another great example of keeping the reader in suspense. Go back and read Chapter 8 one more time. Notice how slowly and mysteriously we learned about what Eliza saw. Any time your detective finds a shocking clue, it’s a great excuse to take things slowly and keep your reader in suspense.

  IDEA STORM: MAKE THE DETECTIVE SNOOP AROUND

  Would you like your detective to do some snooping around? It’s easy to do: Just think about a place in your setting where the detective hasn’t been yet, or isn’t supposed to go, and have them look there. You might also want to go back to the Detective Dossier (see this page), and think about how your detective would use their skills to snoop around. For example, if they’re a master of disguise, do they put on a costume and pretend to be someone else to get where they want to go? Or if they have great powers of observation, it’s possible they don’t need to snoop for very long. Maybe all they need is for someone to open a door for them so they can look around for five seconds to see if they notice any clues.

  What will your detective find while snooping around? That’s up to you, but here are a few ideas to get you started:

  An unexpected secret. Eliza found dangerous plants, but the secret in your story could be anything: Maybe your detective spoils the preparation for a surprise party…or finds an animal they didn’t know was there…or an escaped convict…or a secret laboratory. It can be a big secret, a small secret, or maybe even the secret about your setting from way back on the Mystery Setting organizer!

  A clue about the culprit. You should have already read “Detective’s Notebook: The Investigation (Keeping Track of Clues)” on this page, and started to fill out your own Investigation Record (if you didn’t, go do that now!). While your detective is snooping around, it’s a great time for them to find one of the clues you’ve been planning that gives a hint about who your culprit is. Look at your Investigation Record, under “How did the detective find this clue?” and write down where and how the detective was snooping around. For example: “Eliza was snooping around the house at night.”

  They get caught. This happens a lot in mysteries! Before they’re able to see any clues, or uncover any secrets, somebody catches the detective in the act of snooping around. They’ll have to try again later. This can also be a great way to create suspense. If the detective gets caught before they can look inside the basement (or the teachers’ lounge…or the Ferris wheel control booth…or wherever you decide to send them), then your reader will be wondering, “What’s in there?” They’ll suspect there’s some kind of secret and will be excited for the detective to finally go back there later.

  If you got here by flipping forward from this page, flip back and keep reading!

  * * *

  DETECTIVE’S NOTEBOOK: WATCH OUT FOR SUSPICIOUS BEHAVIOR

  What in the world was Tommy up to? Why did he act so nervous when the “ghost” left the shop? Where did he really go when he said he was headed out for a walk? Why did he sneak into the room with the rare plants? What happened to his eyes? What could explain this suspicious behavior?

  Suspicious behavior is a great clue to put in a mystery story. If someone is acting strangely, and doing things that don’t seem to make sense, or that are very secretive, that could be a sign that they’re up to no good or have something to hide.

  How does a detective spot suspicious behavior? Sometimes it’s similar to what Eliza did: They follow someone to see where they’re going, and notice suspicious behavior along the way. In some cases a detective might go on a stakeout: they hide in one spot where they think the culprit might show up, and watch to see if anything suspicious happens. Or sometimes a witness tells the detective about the suspicious behavior. A witness is a character who sees something important about the mystery. (“I saw a pizza delivery truck parked by the amusement park, and the delivery guy was climbing the fence. Don’t you think that sounds suspicious, Detective?”)

  Does this suspicious behavior mean Tommy is the culprit? Not necessarily. What he did was definitely strange, but there might be a reason for his behavior we don’t know yet.

  Since we can’t tell you more yet about why Tommy did what he did, let’s look at a few more examples of suspicious behavior to help you practice your skills.


  MYSTERY WRITER CHALLENGE: STUDYING SUSPICIOUS BEHAVIOR

  Try this game called “Very Suspicious!”

  It’s midnight in the park. You’re a detective on a stakeout. It’s been quiet all evening, and you’re starting to get sleepy. Suddenly, from behind a tree, you see something moving. A figure walks slowly into a nearby field, but it’s too dark to see their face. They are holding something….The light of the moon reflects off metal, and you realize that it’s a shovel. The figure begins to dig in the field. And dig…and dig…

  Why is this shadowy figure acting so suspiciously?

  A. They are digging a hole to hide stolen jewels.

  B. They stole some jewels many years ago and hid them in this field. Now they have finally returned to find them.

  C. There is a top secret laboratory hidden under the park. They are trying to dig down to an entrance.

  D. They work for the park and are planting flowers. They work at night so they don’t bother people during the day.

  The answer is…

  Keep reading for spoilers…

  It could be any of these! That’s the thing about suspicious behavior: It’s weird; it makes you suspect that someone is up to no good. They could just be planting flowers (or something else totally innocent), but you can’t say for sure quite yet. The detective needs to keep investigating.

  Here are a couple more examples. For each one, see if you can come up with your own answer for option D that is completely different from the other possibilities.

  1. It’s a busy night at the restaurant. People are eating at every table, and waiters bring food back and forth from the kitchen. A woman is sneaking slowly through the restaurant: hiding behind curtains, ducking under tables, pretending to sit at a table for a moment, then crouching behind a chair, looking around.

  Why is this woman acting so suspiciously?

  A. She’s the chef, and is spying on the customers to see how they like the food.

  B. She’s a detective, and is doing a terrible job snooping around to look for clues.

  C. She used to be a cat, but has been transformed into a human. She’s just acting normal—for a cat.

  D. What other reason can you come up with for her suspicious behavior?

  2. The winter has been cold, and there is snow piled up behind the old castle. A window opens high in a tower, and a kid appears, quickly throws a big red bag out the window, then shuts the window and is gone again. The bag falls down and sinks out of sight under the snow.

  Why was this kid acting so suspiciously?

  A. The bag is full of candy the kid has been secretly hiding. He threw it out the window to get rid of the evidence.

  B. There’s a small but very dangerous animal in the bag. The kid caught it in the castle, then got it outside as quickly as possible.

  C. The kid was supposed to take the garbage out but was being suuuuper lazy.

  D. What other reason can you come up with for his suspicious behavior?

  IDEA STORM: MAKE A CHARACTER DO SOMETHING SUSPICIOUS

  Think about your setting and then think about something a character could do there that would be unusual…weird…suspicious. Decide why you think the character is being suspicious. Are they protecting a secret somewhere in the setting? Are they the culprit, and the suspicious behavior winds up being an important clue? Are they doing something innocent that just looks suspicious? Or is the answer something weirder?

  Be sure to decide how the detective sees the suspicious behavior. Are they following the character? Are they on a stakeout? Do they hear about it from a witness?

  If the suspicious behavior ends up providing a clue (Tommy was in the rare plant room, and has yellow eyes), you can make a note of it in your Investigation Record (see this page). And at the very least, maybe the person acting suspicious will turn out to be a suspect….

  DETECTIVE’S NOTEBOOK: IDENTIFY THE SUSPECTS

  “Which one of them did it?”

  That’s what you want your reader wondering. Don’t make it too easy for them, either. If there’s only one other person in the story besides the detective, it’s going to be pretty obvious who the culprit is. For that reason, you need to give your readers plenty of suspects to choose from: other characters who might have done it.

  If you want to decide on some suspects, the easiest place to start is with your setting. Remember when we asked you to pick a setting with lots of people around? This is why! Ask yourself: Who spends time in the setting? What motive (or reason) would they have for causing the mystery? If they have a good motive, they might be the culprit.

  In Chapter 11, we met a new suspect who might be behind Eliza’s ghost mystery…and found out some disturbing new details about other characters who could be suspects, too. What motives do they have? What is the evidence against them? Take a look on this page.

  We can’t say for sure yet who the culprit is…but this list of suspects gives us a place to start! The detective needs to look more closely at all of these suspects to see what else we can find out. How does the detective do that? As we discussed in “Detective’s Notebook: Watch Out for Suspicious Behavior,” they might follow them, or go on a stakeout. They might snoop around near where the suspect spends time. They might also just ask the suspect a lot of questions about the mystery to see what they can find out. For one example of that, read the next chapter!

  SUSPECT #1: MR. CARROLL

  MOTIVE: He’s dealing in dangerous plants. Maybe trying to scare Eliza away from his secrets.

  EVIDENCE AGAINST HIM: Eliza saw him bringing plants in through the basement.

  OTHER DETAILS: Makes horrible puns all the time

  SUSPECT #2: MRS. CARROLL

  MOTIVE: Works with her husband, may be helping him

  EVIDENCE AGAINST HER: Nothing conclusive

  OTHER DETAILS: Talks to plants

  SUSPECT #3: TOMMY

  MOTIVE: Could be trying to protect his uncle

  EVIDENCE AGAINST HIM: Suspicious behavior, yellow eyes

  OTHER DETAILS: Very interested in plants; very shy and weird around Eliza

  SUSPECT #4: WEIRD CUSTOMER

  MOTIVE: Being a ghost (?)

  EVIDENCE AGAINST HIM: Old-timey way of talking. Moves silently. Could be a ghost!!

  OTHER DETAILS: Wide hat, long coat, sunglasses, Moggie growled at him

  SUSPECT #5: MOGGIE

  MOTIVE: Unknown

  EVIDENCE AGAINST HER: Yellow eyes

  OTHER DETAILS: A dog, so probably not the top suspect

  SUSPECT #6: UNKNOWN

  Who was that guy handing plants to Mr. Carroll in the basement? Is there anyone else hanging around that we don’t know about?

  IDEA STORM: CREATE SOME SUSPECTS

  Come up with some suspects of your own! You can draw pictures of them and keep track of what their motives might be, what the evidence is against them, and any other details you want to remember.

  Here’s another important thing detectives often look for with their suspects: an alibi. If the suspect has an alibi, that means they were somewhere else when the mystery took place, so they probably couldn’t be the culprit. If the suspect doesn’t have an alibi (or if the alibi turns out to be a lie), the detective will have reason to be very suspicious.

  If your detective follows a suspect, or goes on a stakeout, asks the suspect questions, snoops around, and ends up finding clues, be sure to note that on your Investigation Record (see this page).

  If you got here by flipping forward from this page, flip back and keep reading!

  * * *

  DETECTIVE’S NOTEBOOK: THE CULPRIT STRIKES AGAIN!

  It’s every detective’s worst fear: Yet another thing is MISSING (“First the diamonds were stolen from the museum, now a priceless painting!”) or something new is WEIRD or DOESN’T BELONG in the setting (“The mu
rderer has struck again!”).

  Sometimes, though, this actually helps the detective to get important new clues that help solve the case. Causing a mystery is risky, and every time the culprit does it, there’s more and more chance of getting caught.

  For example, when the rare plant went MISSING, Eliza thought Tommy might have had something to do with it. That’s what made her decide to question Mr. and Mrs. Carroll, which is when she found her next clue: They both had yellow eyes! Now she knows that no matter what is causing all these mysterious events, the Carrolls must be involved somehow, which will be very important when she decides what to do next….

  IDEA STORM: WILL YOUR CULPRIT STRIKE AGAIN?

  Do you want the culprit to strike again in your mystery? You don’t have to—not all mysteries do this. But if you do, here’s how you might think about it:

  Decide why the culprit did it. Was it the same reason they did it the first time? If they dug a hole in the bottom of the pool looking for treasure…do they dig a hole in the bottom of another pool, looking for treasure again? Or maybe they were trying to get rid of evidence—was there an important clue inside the pizza dough, so they ate it before anyone could find it?

  Decide how they did it. Did anyone see the culprit do something suspicious? Did they leave any new clues behind? Once again, you can look at your Culprit Case File on pages 220–221 to get ideas for what kind of clues they might end up leaving. If they always wear lots of necklaces, does someone hear the sound of jangling jewelry near where the mystery happens? If they work at a pancake factory, does a smell of pancakes linger in the air?