Mystery Reporter's Challenge 2025

  

Mystery Reporter's Challenge 2025 is sponsored by Ellie in The Challenge Factory on Goodreads.

My post in the challenge: HERE

Who? What? When? Where? Why?

How--In a cozy chair with a hot cup of cocoa and a box of bonbons!

I'll be going for the Columnist level (2 books from each basic category) and hoping to complete them all.

Cub Reporter: 5 books (one from each category): Complete 2/26/25

Columnist: 10 books (two from each): Complete 3/13/25

News Anchor: 15 books (three from each) 

Editor: 20 books (four from each) 

Newspaper Mogul: 25 books (all five from each)

Bonus Category:

Pulitzer Prize Winner = Newspaper Mogul plus bonus categories (30 books)

Extra Bonus Category

Nobel Prize for Literature = Pulitzer plus final bonus category (31 books) 

WHO

Protagonist is established in their business/career: Dangerous Davies: The Last Detective by Leslie Thomas (1/11/25)

Character is a dead person (ghost/vampire/zombie/etc.):

Main Character works with animals: The Mystery of the Merry Magician by Ellery Queen, Jr. [magician works w/Banjo the dog] (5/3/25)

Side Character is fun/kooky (you want to be BFFs):

Character works with books/writes: Deadly Is the Diamond by Mary Roberts Rinehart [narrator is a writer] (2/22/25)

WHAT

Number in title: A Thief or Two by Sara Woods (3/13/25)

Food in title:

Title starts with letter in your first name: Behold a Fair Woman by Francis Duncan (2/26/25)

Holiday in title:

Title is play on words:

WHERE

City that starts with C, M, or T: The Sleep Is Deep by Hugh Lawrence Nelson [Colorado City] (3/14/25)

Set in hotel/B&B/Air BnB: The Book of Killowen by Erin Hart (2/4/25)

Set in a Midwest state:

Set in a popular vacation spot: The Talk Show Murders by Steve Allen [Hollywood/LA, CA] (6/12/25)

Set on foreign soil (not US or England): Murder in Williamstown by Kerry Greenwood [Australia] (2/15/25)

WHEN

Set during celebration: Six Nuns & a Shotgun by Colin Watson [annual Medieval banquet] (5/9/25)

Set in 1900s: The Deadly Truth by Helen McCloy (1/15/25)

Set during winter: Thief Is an Ugly Word by Paul Gallico [January] (2/17/25)

Set during fall: Murder by Lamplight by Patrice McDonough (3/19/25)

Set during storm:

HOW

Strangled: The Devil's Flute Murders by Seishi Yokomizo (1/5/25)

Stabbed: The Art School Murders by Moray Dalton (1/20/25)

Shot: Poison for Teacher by Nancy Spain [one was poisoned--but also one shot] (1/31/25)

Poisoned: The Cloisters by Katy Hays (1/24/25)

Blunt Instrument: The Last Resort by Michael Kaufman (2/13/25)

BONUS--Pulitzer Prize

Who--you figured out who did it before the protagonist: "Inquest" by Henrietta Clandon (2/21/25)

What--title at least six words: The Girl from the Mimosa Club by Leslie Ford (2/6/25)

Where--set in fictional place you'd like to live: Capital Crimes: London Mysteries by Martin Edwards, ed (2/10/25)

When--during a holiday (not Christmas or Halloween): Ambush for Anatole by John Sherwood [August Bank Holiday] (3/17/25)

How--unpremeditated: No Vacation from Murder by Elizabeth Lemarchand (3/18/25)

Extra Bonus--Nobel Prize 

Horoscope: Pick a horoscope from the 15th of any month and read a book related to the horoscope

My horoscope [Cancer] from February 15, 2025 (from the Chicago Sun Times): Today you want to make home improvements, which is why you're determined in some way. However, this could lead to family arguments, especially if you get pushy. Unfortunately, this is the kind of day where it's easy to become obsessed with an idea. Lighten up.

The Green Mill Murder by Kerry Greenwood (3/23/25) There are family arguments and a mother obsessed with the "perfection" of her sons involved in the mystery Phryne Fisher investigates.