The Westing Game Characters

Turtle is the youngest of the Westing heirs and one of the most misunderstood. She's also one of the most intelligent characters and one of the most committed to playing the Westing game. What's mo...

Angela is really pretty; she looks a lot like Violet Westing, who met a tragic end, and like her mother. That beauty's the first thing people notice about her, and it's usually all they give her cr...

It's hard to know whether to hate Grace or feel sorry for her. She's easily the most pretentious character, and a contender for the most obnoxious, too. She fancies herself as an interior decorator...

Theo's the kind of person who gives his half of the $10,000 to his parents. Who does that? Think about it: that's a pretty rare quality. When we first meet Theo, he's a high school senior, and a li...

While it's tempting to quickly define Chris as the disabled kid in a wheelchair, he's more than that. He's one of the most thoughtful, considerate characters in the book, although many of the other...

Sandy is the poorly-educated doorman at Sunset Towers. Here are the things we know about him: he tells us he has a wife and children, whom we never meet, and he's pretty open about his poverty/soci...

Dr. Deere is kind of a mystery. At first, it seems like he's only included in the game peripherally as Angela's fiancé, the plastic surgeon intern. Grace thinks it makes perfect sense to inclu...

Otis seems to be a delivery boy with a low IQ. Remember, though, everything's not as it seems in this book; he's actually a skilled private investigator on a long-term retainer. Sam Westing hired h...

Crow – everybody just calls her by her last name – is the cleaning lady at Sunset Towers. We know she's also a recovering alcoholic, and she seems to be in some kind of relationship wit...

Sydelle Pulaski is a mistake. Well, that's not all she is, but that's supposedly her biggest role in this mystery; her part was supposed to be played by someone else. The private investigator Barne...

Flora is a divorced seamstress who now lives alone. She's hired to make Angela's wedding dress and once also made one for Violet Westing. She smiles all the time, especially in inappropriate situat...

Mr. Hoo is a frustrated inventor who ends up running a Chinese restaurant. He seems concerned with not appearing authentically Chinese enough, so he adds "Shin" to his name and marries a native Chi...

Madame Hoo spends a lot of the book without a voice. She emigrated from China as Mr. Hoo's second wife – although we never really figure out why she married him – and doesn't speak very...

Doug is a high school senior who Turtle thinks is pretty cute, even though he teases her and plays dumb jokes. He's an extremely good runner and the star of the local track team. Everyone has high...

WARNING: This section contains massive spoilers. Even though we don't really meet Sam Westing as "Sam Westing" during the course of the book, we do meet several versions of him in the disguises he...

We know from the start that Barney Northrup is not a real person, but we don't find out who's impersonating him until nearly the end of the book. What we do know about him is he's a fast-talking re...

Mr. Eastman is the chairman of the board of Westing Paper Products Corporation. SPOILER: He's not a real person, but the fourth identity of Sam Westing.

Ed Plum is the inexperienced, youthful lawyer Westing chooses to handle his will. Judge Ford is surprised that someone that rough would be chosen for the job. Plum has an annoying habit of clearing...

George is not a player in the Westing Game. He's the former boyfriend of Violet Westing, and his sons, Theo and Chris, are both named heirs in the Westing will. He provides important information to...

Catherine is not a player in the Westing game. She's the mother of two players, Theo and Chris, and married to George Theodorakis, who is the former boyfriend of Violet Westing.

Dr. Sikes is Westing's friend and fellow plotter who's in the car accident with him, and helps him create the physical disguises he assumes as other characters.

Rosalie is the deceased daughter of Flora Baumbach. Rosalie had Down's syndrome and her mother describes her as the "lovingest person there ever was" (11.6).

Violet is the deceased daughter of the Westings, and she looks like Angela and Grace Wexler. She used to go out with George Theodorakis, until her mother started to push her into marriage with a co...

Mr. Schultz is the president of Schultz Sausages, where Sydelle worked as a secretary. He eventually becomes her husband.

Shirley is Chris's college girlfriend, later his wife, and a fellow ornithologist.

Alice is Angela and Dr. Deere's daughter, and the beloved niece of Turtle. She plays chess with her aunt at the end of the book.