My daughter and son-in-law gave me a one-thousand
piece puzzle. It has been years since I’ve put a puzzle together
and I thought it would be fun. However, as soon as I dumped out the pieces on
the table I realized that putting the puzzle together would be much like me writing
a mystery novel.
First, the
big pile of pieces is like the big mishmash of ideas, clues, scenes,
characters, and settings that make up the notes I have for my mystery. Before I
can start the puzzle I have to turn all the pieces upright so I can see their colour,
just as I have to sort through my notes when I start my novel. I have to decide
where in the story my book begins much like I have to decide how to start my
puzzle. I can outline my novel as some writers do or I can jump in and start
writing. With the puzzle, I can find all the outer edge pieces and put them together
or pick scenes of the picture and find the colours to match.
I decide to
start with outer edge and I sift through the pile to find them. I return the
rest to the box. As I work on the edge I have to go back through the box to
find edge pieces I missed, just like I have to go through my manuscript and
find where I have missed adding some important information or missed putting in
a misdirection.
Because of
the way they are cut, it is hard to decide if a piece is part of the outside
edge or if it is a regular piece. Just like writing, is that a clue or a red
herring?
With the
puzzle I know at the beginning what the end result will be because of the
picture on the box. Sometimes when I start my mystery, I know the ending,
however sometimes the characters say or do something that I hadn’t planned on
and I am left trying to figure out how to get them out of a situation or how to
diffuse something they have said.
I learned
that there are various names for the parts of a puzzle piece: loops and sockets; knobs and holes; tabs
and slots; keys and locks; even outies or innies. Sometimes it is frustrating to try and get knobs to fit into the
holes. The colour looks the same only the tab doesn’t fit correctly into the
slot. Or the pieces lock perfectly but there is a slight difference in colour. If
one doesn’t seem to fit in a spot, I have to match it somewhere else. That is
the same with my writing. Sometimes I come up with a good line or a scene only
to find that it doesn’t suit where I want it and I have to find a better match somewhere
else.
When I get
stuck with trying to figure out where my story goes next, I can work on a
different section in my novel. In the puzzle if I can’t seem to make a scene
come together I can go to a different part and work there. Every puzzle piece is
tailored to go with the rest to make the picture just like every clue, every scene,
every red herring has to fit into the story properly.
What is
frustrating to a puzzle solver is finding that one or two pieces are missing at
the end. This is true for the reader of a mystery. All the clues have to be
pulled together, the red herrings explained, the mystery solved, and the
murderer caught. I can’t leave any pieces out.
And the
last thing I realized about how putting puzzles together and writing mysteries are
similar is that both of them are an excruciatingly slow process for me.
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