Volume One · The Puzzle Master's Casebook How to Work the Pages

Two witnesses, solved start to finish — then onto the case pages.

A companion walkthrough

The Loop — Four Pages per Witness

Then you write what you learned on the case pages at the back, and turn to the puzzle the message named. Forty-eight times.

Worked Example One — Puzzle 33, The Neighbor Walking Her Dog

Pages 138–141 · your first witness

1Solve the sudoku and read off the eight letters

The grid is already almost complete. Only eight cells are lettered A through H. Each one has exactly one digit that can legally go there — find it by the usual rule: each row, column and 3×3 box holds 1–9 once.

Page 138. Eight lettered cells, A–H.

Row by row, the missing digit in each lettered row gives you:

2Turn the letters into clue numbers

Go to the Decoder Table under the grid. Find your letter's row, then run across to the column matching the digit you just solved. The number sitting in that cell is your clue number.

The Decoder Table on page 138.

A is 4, so read row A, column 4 → 2. B is 9, so row B, column 9 → 6. Carry on:

Write those eight numbers on the numbered lines beside the sudoku. They are the only thing you carry forward from this page.

3Solve the crossword

Your eight numbers point at eight of the twelve crossword clues. Solve the whole grid normally — the four extra answers are there to give you crossing letters and confirm the eight that matter.

Page 140. Clues 2, 6, 7, 12, 3, 9, 11 and 8 are the ones you need.

4Write the eight words in A–H order

This is the step people skip. Take your clue numbers in letter order and write each answer on the eight lines at the bottom of page 140:

5Find the eight words in the word search

All eight are hidden on page 141 — forwards, backwards, across, down or diagonally. Circle each one as you find it.

Page 141. Circle all eight, then read what is left.

6Read the leftover letters

Every letter you did not circle is part of the message. Read them left to right, top row to bottom row, straight through — ignore the circled ones entirely. They spell:

Two things came out of that sentence. A sighting — sidewalk, that morning — and your next witness. If the sentence doesn't read as English, one of your eight words is wrong; go back and check the crossword rather than pressing on.

The finished crossword (answer key, page 244).

The word search with all eight found.

Worked Example Two — Puzzle 11, The Barista

Pages 50–53 · the message from Puzzle 33 sent you here

Exactly the same loop, run at speed.

1Sudoku → letters

Page 50.

2Decoder → clue numbers

The Decoder Table on page 50. Note it is a different table from Puzzle 33 — every witness has their own.

3Crossword → the eight words, in A–H order

Page 52.

4Word search → the message

Page 53.

Another sighting — the cafe, midday — and one extra thing. She was texting, not calling. Hold on to that. Somewhere in the book another witness claims she was on a phone call. One of them is wrong, and this is how you will know which.

The finished crossword (answer key, page 222).

The word search with all eight found.

What Goes on the Case Pages

Pages 202–207 · after two witnesses

You now have two results. Here is where each piece of them lands. Do this as you go, not at the end.

The Elimination — pages 202–204

Forty-eight numbered lines. Write each hidden message on the next blank line, in the order you solved the puzzles. Not by puzzle number. Line 1 is Puzzle 33 because Puzzle 33 is where the book sent you first.

Where She Was Seen — page 205

Only for witnesses who actually laid eyes on Eleanor. Twenty-three of the forty-eight did; the rest saw the search, the paperwork or the weather. Both of ours saw her, so both get a row.

Leave the last column empty for now. You fill it in later, when a witness turns up who refutes an earlier account. When that happens, note what refuted it and strike the row through — but keep it. A struck row still does work on the grid.

How She Seemed — page 206

Nothing goes here yet. This page takes only the four witnesses who never saw her that day but knew her, and each gives one word. Neither of ours qualifies. These four words never go on the Elimination Grid — they answer why, not where.

The Elimination Grid — page 207

Twenty-two locations down the side, eight time slots across. Every sighting you recorded on page 205 gets a tick in the square where its place meets its time.

Midday is Noon, unambiguously. That morning is looser — use the witness's own routine to place it, and a neighbour out walking a dog is Early Morning. Where a message names a slot outright, use the slot it names.

Then the four rules on that page do the rest of the work:

1. Every witness who saw her gives a place and a time. Tick that square.
2. Seven accounts get struck by later witnesses. The page lists all seven.
3. Cross off every location a surviving witness ticks. She was there, and she moved on.
4. Cross off every location that only a struck-out witness named. That sighting never happened.

One location survives both passes. No witness ever placed her there — which is exactly why nobody found her.

Where People Go Wrong

• Starting at Puzzle 1. Page 9 sends you to Puzzle 33. The printed order is a filing order, not a reading order.
• Writing the eight words in clue-number order. They go in A–H order, set by the sudoku letters. The word search will still work; the message will not.
• Reusing a decoder table. Every witness has their own. The same letter and digit give different clue numbers in different puzzles.
• Skipping the four spare crossword answers. Solve the whole grid. The extra four are how you catch a wrong letter before it reaches the word search.
• Pressing on when the message reads like nonsense. That is the book telling you one of your eight words is wrong. It is a checksum, not a typo.
• Filling the case pages at the end. The elimination lines are numbered in solve order. Fill them as you reach them or you will not be able to reconstruct the sequence.
• Putting the four How She Seemed words on the grid. They are not sightings. They belong to the second question.

Forty-eight witnesses. Twenty-three saw her. Seven of those were lying, or wrong.
One place nobody named.