I was really excited to get the chance to read Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson. Many thanks to the publisher for the gift! This fun take on the manor house mystery will release January 2023, and I honestly liked it so much that I’ll probably buy myself a copy to lend to my other mystery-loving friends.

Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone is written in first-person by Ernest Cunningham. Ernest (or Ern, or Ernie) is a self-published author of advice pamphlets for crime writers, and his voice reflects his knowledge of mystery stories. The story kicks off when Ern’s aunt Katherine invites him to a mandatory family reunion at a ski resort. There’s a murder on the premises, and (of course) the resort gets snowed in. And so, as per the classic Golden Age trope, Ern and his family set to solving the case.

A meta-textual murder mystery

The book opens with an epigraph from Ronald Knox on the “Ten Commandments of Detective Fiction”. These, Ern tells us, are the rules that make Golden Age mysteries great. Therefore, they are the rules he will adhere to as he tells his story. As a narrator, Ern is smart and snarky, and it’s fun to watch him navigate the events of the book. He promises “fair play”, and he pauses the narrative to remind the reader of critical questions and clues. It’s a testament of the quality of Stevenson’s writing that it’s still easy to get swept up in the narrative. No spoilers, but even the first chapter manages to blend wit and observational humor with hard-hitting reflections on family.

Structurally, the book is a puzzle made of smaller puzzles. Ern promises that everyone in his family has killed someone, and each section focuses on a single family member and the death they caused. These mini-puzzles are wrapped up in the larger, overarching puzzle of the mystery in the present-day. If the best puzzles make you feel smart, this structure offers plenty of opportunities to get that little frisson of solving something. It also creates focus that helps you navigate Ern’s expansive cast of family members.

A love letter to the manor house mystery

The family themselves are the main event, and over the course of the novel we get to break down Ern’s relationship with each one. One of the best parts of a manor house mystery is untangling the relationships between all the guests. Here, we replicate that dynamic, except with Ern steering us through the family. Each of the characters is well-realized and feels like a full person (though I may be referencing stock characters I’m familiar with…).

Families are particularly tough topics, and Stevenson does a great job of exploring why. Ern starts the novel estranged from his family, and nervous to meet them. While my family has (to my knowledge) killed zero people, the anxiety about the mandatory family reunion is still highly relatable. Stevenson uses the Cunningham-Garcias to explore the definition of family loyalty, for a manor house mystery with substance.

Of course, it’s no manor house murder mystery without a great (wintry) setting. Stevenson, via Ern, sets the scene at exactly the right moments. The chill of the snow and the wind, the crackling fire in the library, and the warmth of the dining hall all bring the story to vivid life. Stevenson inserts these moments to emphasize the drama of the narrative, so that you’re reading with all five senses.

Stevenson’s love of mysteries is present in every page and paragraph. The book is full of references to Golden Age mysteries, and the narration does a great job of “playing fair”. This kind of meta-writing is exactly my cup of tea (I’m a huge fan of Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next and Nursery Crime series for example). There’s something so fun about a book you feel like you can pick up multiple times, finding new clues on each re-read.

Reader’s notes & rating (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

I really enjoyed this book – it fits perfectly into a flavor of self-aware mystery that I love. The narrator is funny, the characters and plot are compelling, and it’d well-written and well-paced. I would strongly recommend it to anyone who already knows and loves mystery novels (especially Golden Age mysteries). That said, it’s very much written for readers already In the Know about mystery stories. That genre-specificity makes this a four-star book for me – and one I can’t wait to get my hands on for real!