Several years ago, I hosted a murder mystery party for some adult friends, but thinking back it was kind of a blur. Chris was getting over pneumonia! I do remember it being a fun way to dress up and spend the evening—everyone had a blast.
So when Greta decided for her 15th birthday party that she wanted to do a murder mystery party with a bunch of her girls, I thought, “What a perfect idea!” I found an online murder mystery pack that fit the criteria, we sent out invites and set up the ambiance and food that day.
I wanted to share all the details on how it went in case this sounds like something your teens (or your friends) would like!
Shop Murder Mystery Decor & Supplies
How We Chose a Murder Mystery Game for Teen Girls
I’m sure there are physical kits for murder mystery games but I wanted one you could download online. I just searched for “teen murder mystery all girls.” I wanted to specify, since a lot of times they’ll have characters that are male and female. I found this scenario called Death Comes to Downturn—a play on Downton Abbey—that was for all girls. They said it was clean, and there wasn’t any swearing, but there was a lot of infidelity. Oh my goodness, that led to some funny prompts on the cards, like: “I’m having his baby.” “He slept with me too!” It made it just spicy enough for them.
With the digital game, you can input however many people you have for the party, and it will assign character parts to each person. and we printed off all of the packets for the 16 girls. It came with invitations to send out. So that was easy! The invites had their character’s name and a description of their character, like “your character is the cook at the mansion”, and it gives them a couple of ideas of what to bring or wear, like a rolling pin or an apron. When the guests arrived, we gave each person a little notebook, a pen, and a nametag for their character.
Silver Candlesticks | Red Taper Candles | Black Notebooks
Now I know we’ve done it before, but I had forgotten—one thing to note is that it’s really like you’re reading a script. No one—not even me—knew who the killer was. You’re kind of acting it out, but then you’re also interacting live. The game tells you what to say and questions to ask of others. And the packet tells that person how to answer if they get asked a certain question. So there is some room for spontaneity, but it doesn’t completely throw you off track.
I would say 16 was a lot of people for a game like this. But I was really impressed that the game had so many speaking parts for everyone. It started off a little slow for the first 45 minutes, but by Act 2 they were all really into it.
The Food We Served at the Murder Mystery Party
Gold Candlesticks | Marble Hand | Glass Canisters | Bust Statue | Two-Tier Stand (similar) | Magnifying Glass | Black Lace Tablecloth
We started the party at 5:30 p.m., and I had a spread of food set out in the dining room, right off of the kitchen. I had charcuterie. I had bacon-wrapped goat cheese stuffed dates. I made little tea sandwiches and BLT sliders. There was a veggie tray and some fruit. But here’s what I didn’t think about: because each round takes about 40 minutes, after their first round, the food seemed like it was almost gone. I quick-texted Chris, hey, we need to restock this food table ASAP!! So I cleared off the charcuterie board and reorganized it. I put out some popcorn. We made some mini bruschetta and added meatballs to the table. Whew. It worked.
During the third round—we were 2 hours in at this point—I cleared off the table and served them all ice cream. But I did something a little unexpected: I served “mystery” ice cream. I purchased 10 pints of Van Leeuven ice cream and had them in my freezer ready to go. They have the craziest flavors, like Kraft Mac & Cheese or pizza. And they have the most beautiful ice cream packaging! I scooped out 16 bowls of ice cream from different pints and served them randomly while they were still playing the game in the living room. I didn’t want to interrupt the flow, but it was like a fun surprise mystery they could chat about!
The fourth round was the reveal, and it was a lot faster. During that round, I set out macaroons, brownies…just a few little desserts on the table. That’s when they revealed who the murderer was to squeals of delight.
Dining Room Sources
So what went well? Actually, the bruschetta was the hit in terms of food! I almost nixed it at first, thinking we had too much food, but I’m glad we didn’t. The cucumber tea sandwiches and BLT sliders went so fast. I think we made two for each person? Gone in minutes! We also put out sodas and water for the girls to sip on, and that was easy so they could pick what they wanted.
What would I do differently? We had ordered a charcuterie board from a local company (my daughters love charcuterie). But I realized, it’s always kind of a little awkward for this age—it looks like a good idea for a party, but actually it’s hard for people to see what’s on there. The individual items fared a lot better.
Decorating My Home for a Murder Mystery Party
The key element in the party? Candalabras and candles—tons of them. I went with drippy candles (some bleeding ones left over from Halloween!) for enhanced dramatic effect and they added to the vibe, but they were a pain to clean up. Dripless candles would have been just as beautiful.
Vase | Mirrored Tray | Taper Candles | Candelabra | Magnifying Glass
The game came with a little jail sign that I printed off as an extra prop. Since her birthday is so close to Valentine’s Day, I actually had a lot of decor that worked double duty. My biggest decor purchase was 3 dozen red roses and other than that, I pretty much used decor I already had from Halloween or just around my house: Stacks of books, a bird sculpture, a magnifying glass–anything to make the table feel a little more spooky.
We took Polaroids of everyone dressed up. I did have a little jail sign that came with that I printed off as an extra prop. But really, I just got a Fuji Instax camera, and they had so much fun taking pictures.
I did get a portable rolling TV for the game (and for us to use in the living room since we don’t have a TV there). There was a video element to the game with a narrator, and that made it easy for me to show videos to the whole group. We’ve already used it several times since, especially when Polly had a flare-up. I’m really happy with the investment!
Portable TV
The Verdict?
The girls had such a blast—it really was the perfect birthday party for this age!!
One thing I learned for next time: I probably would start the game and then have a food break. It was even in the script: “Take a break after round 1.” Because we started with food, I was serving even more rounds of food than I had planned, which is fine but caused me to scramble a bit!
Another helpful tip is when you invite young kids to a murder mystery party, you could have a rack of costumes available, like velvet blazers or dresses. Some of the guests were dressed up and some weren’t. If I had thought about it, I could have pulled together a rack of dress-up clothes for the girls easily from past Halloweens and party clothes!
As far as “moderating” the game as the narrator, I should have encouraged more conversations that summarize what they learned. Like, “So what happened in this round?” to get them all summarizing the clues. I also wish I could have read the whole scenario through so I knew more of what was going on. Sometimes they could have used helpful hints. At one point, the girls asked if they could go out of order for the questions. I said yes—not really knowing. Luckily it was fine!
I really liked the game we picked because it came with a video narrator. I was there to kind of operate the narrator, but honestly I could have probably passed that off to one of the players. I didn’t need to be as hands-on with that part!
It was a really fun night. I was worried because it started off a little slow, but as soon as they got to the juicy parts, the game really came alive. Oh teens! Haha. The game took 2.5-3 hours but the time was flying. I can’t wait to host another one.
