Books
Who Can Solve the Mystery of Cain’s Jawbone?
A literary puzzle from the 1930s is having a revival
When I visited the library a few weeks ago, I ran into one of my favorite co-workers from — yes — my old library job. So I can’t say it was a totally unexpected pleasure to run into her there, but it was so nice to get back in touch with someone I hadn’t seen in quite a few years.
She gave me her contact info, and soon after, we got together for a long lunch and one of those relaxed and mutually interested conversations that make me grateful that I do sometimes overcome my shyness and leave the house. It’s not easy to make a friend or renew a friendship as an adult, and I consider this a gift.
A few days after our lunch, my friend texted to ask if I’d heard of a book called Cain’s Jawbone. She’d bought it and had been looking through it a bit, and she found the writing style to be clever and funny. She took a photo of a page and sent it to me.
She explained that the book was written intentionally as a literary puzzle. It has 100 pages, but they’ve been printed out of order, so the idea is to figure out the true order of the pages — and to determine what six murders have taken place and the names of all six murderers.
