The Westing Game
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50 free The Westing Game trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Ellen Raskin's The Westing Game has kept classrooms guessing since 1978. An eccentric millionaire is found dead, and his will summons the tenants of the Sunset Towers apartment building to a strange contest. They are paired off, handed a few odd words as clues, and told that the fortune goes to whoever solves the puzzle he left behind. Nobody in the building is quite who they seem. This quiz follows the book from the opening chapter to the last page. There are questions on Turtle Wexler and the other heirs, their jobs, secrets and partners, on the reading of the will, the days the tenants spend shut in together, the bombs, the thefts and the trial where everything comes out, plus a few on the author, the prizes and the film version. It is written for middle school readers and for the teachers and parents reading along with them. Every multiple-choice answer comes with a short explanation, so it works as a comprehension check, a chapter review, a book club warm-up or a printable final quiz. Be warned: the later questions give away the ending.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In The Westing Game, what does Turtle Wexler do to anyone who dares to touch her braid?
Kicks them in the shin
Kicks them in the shin is Turtle's rule, and half of Sunset Towers has the bruises to prove it. A bruised shin on the wrong man later helps her crack the whole mystery.
Q 02The clues handed to the heirs in The Westing Game are words taken from which patriotic song?
America the Beautiful
America the Beautiful supplies every clue, and Sydelle Pulaski proves it by singing the verses aloud. The heirs still guess wrong, because the real answer hides in the words left out.
Q 03Which heir, the last one anyone suspects, turns out to be Sam Westing himself in disguise?
Sandy McSouthers
Sandy McSouthers, the friendly doorman, is the millionaire all along. Judge Ford works it out too late: her own partner was the one heir she had never investigated.
Q 04Despite its name, which direction does Sunset Towers in The Westing Game face?
East
East is the wrong way for watching a sunset, and the five-story building has no towers either. The opening page is a warning that nothing in this story is quite what its name says.
Q 05Which shocking claim does Sam Westing's will make to the heirs gathered to hear it?
One of them killed him
One of them killed him, the will says, in a way too clever for the police to catch. That single sentence turns sixteen heirs into suspects and detectives at once.
Q 06Where does Turtle Wexler put the check she shares with her partner, Flora Baumbach?
The stock market
The stock market is how Turtle reads the will's advice to 'take stock' in the country. She is wrong about what the clues mean, yet she and Flora finish with more than $11,000.
Q 07Why does Turtle Wexler confess to planting every bomb that goes off in Sunset Towers?
To protect her sister
To protect her sister, Turtle sets off one last blast herself and takes the blame. Angela, the real bomber, is the one tenant nobody thought to suspect.
Q 08What does Turtle Wexler do with her team's set of clues so that no other heir can read a word?
Swallows it
Swallows it, right at the card table, once Flora Baumbach has the words memorized. It leaves her rivals guessing while she quietly follows her own theory.
Q 09Which prop does secretary Sydelle Pulaski fake a need for so that her neighbors finally notice her?
Painted crutches
Painted crutches are Sydelle's bid for attention, along with a wasting disease she invents to go with them. A hospital doctor later calls the crutches a touch of genius from a lonely woman.
Q 10What is the real profession of Otis Amber, the 62-year-old delivery 'boy' of The Westing Game?
Private investigator
Private investigator is the job Otis admits to at Turtle's mock trial. Judge Ford had even hired him by phone, puzzled by a voice she was sure she had heard before.
Q 11In The Westing Game, the words missing from the heirs' clues spell out which character's full name?
Berthe Erica Crow
Berthe Erica Crow, the Sunset Towers cleaning woman, was once married to Sam Westing. When no one else will say it, she gives her own name as the answer.
Q 12Which man, who does not really exist, signs the letters inviting tenants to rent in Sunset Towers?
Barney Northrup
Barney Northrup, a salesman in a bad wig, rents out the whole building in a day by telling each visitor only one apartment is left. The narrator admits from the start that there is no such person.
Q 13Under which name is Sam Westing living when Turtle Wexler finally tracks him down to claim her win?
Julian Eastman
Q 21Which holiday did the patriotic Sam Westing celebrate every year by staging elaborate pageants?
Fourth of July
Fourth of July frames the whole story: the invitations to Sunset Towers go out on that day, and years later it is the day the old man finally dies.
Q 22In which Midwestern state, the home state of author Ellen Raskin, is The Westing Game set?
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is where Raskin was born and grew up, in Milwaukee during the Great Depression. She studied art at the state university before moving to New York.
Q 23Which kind of doctor is Jake Wexler, who rents the medical office in the Sunset Towers lobby?
Podiatrist
Podiatrist, a foot doctor, which is why the building's cleaning woman comes to him to have a corn removed. His wife prefers to explain his absence from the will reading as an 'emergency operation'.
Julian Eastman is the chairman of the company its founder supposedly walked away from years earlier. Turtle bikes to his house, tells him she has won, and keeps his secret for good.
Q 14According to his obituary in The Westing Game, how much is Sam Westing's estate worth?
$200 million
$200 million is the prize dangled before sixteen heirs, yet the last page of the will never mentions it. They are left equal shares of Sunset Towers instead.
Q 15In The Westing Game, which kind of business made millionaire Sam Westing his enormous fortune?
Paper products
Paper products built the fortune and a whole company town, Westingtown, for the workers who made them. The will even signs off by telling the heirs to go out and buy some.
Q 16Which body of water do the luxury Sunset Towers apartments in The Westing Game overlook?
Lake Michigan
Lake Michigan gives the tenants their view, but the windows that matter look the other way, north toward the old Westing house on its cliff.
Q 17On which night of the year does Turtle Wexler sneak into the Westing house to win a bet?
Halloween
Halloween is when Turtle goes in, at two dollars for every minute she lasts. She runs out screaming after finding a body tucked up in a four-poster bed.
Q 18Which costume is Turtle Wexler wearing when she creeps into the Westing house on a dare?
A witch
A witch, in a costume Angela offered to hem. Turtle likes the label so much that she signs 'witch' as her position on the receipt for the will reading.
Q 19Which item taken from her mother does Turtle Wexler later spot in the hands of the corpse?
A silver cross
A silver cross goes into the Westing house in Turtle's pocket and gets left behind when she bolts. At the will reading it is clasped in the hands of the body in the coffin.
Q 20At which game did Sam Westing trick young Josie-Jo Ford by giving up his queen on purpose?
Chess
Chess runs through the whole book: the obituary calls the dead man a master, and a board sits ready in his game room. Judge Ford spots his old queen trick one move too late.
Q 24Which illegal sideline does Jake Wexler, father of Turtle and Angela, run beside his medical work?
Bookmaking
Bookmaking, taking bets on sports, is Jake's secret, and Turtle knows all about it. By the end he has gone straight, working on the government's side of gambling.
Q 25Which hobby fills the days of Chris Theodorakis, who watches the Westing house from his wheelchair?
Birdwatching
Birdwatching through binoculars makes Chris the best witness in the building: he sees a limping figure slip into the Westing house just before smoke rises from its chimney.
Q 26Which sport makes Doug Hoo a high school star in The Westing Game and later an Olympic champion?
Running
Running the mile is Doug's whole life, to the despair of a father who wants him studying. He goes on to win Olympic gold.
Q 27Which pet name does Turtle Wexler start using for her partner, the dressmaker Flora Baumbach?
Baba
Baba comes out of a bomb scare: whenever Turtle shouts 'Mrs. Baumbach' down a hall, jumpy neighbors hear the word bomb. Flora, in turn, calls her Alice.
Q 28Sydelle Pulaski's shorthand notes on the will are unreadable to others because of which language?
Polish
Polish shorthand makes Sydelle the only person able to read the only notes anyone took on the will. The other heirs end up offering her a bigger share of the prize to translate them.
Q 29What traps the heirs inside Sunset Towers for days, right after the first reading of the will?
A blizzard
A blizzard cuts the phones and the power as well, so the heirs can do little but visit one another. The snooping, bargaining and stealing start almost at once.
Q 30What does Turtle Wexler sell door to door, at five dollars each, when Sunset Towers loses power?
Striped candles
Striped candles that mark the hours as they burn are Turtle's own handiwork. One of them is later used to light the fuse of a bomb.