Exercising Our “Gray Cells”
I love mysteries and, of course, I am not alone. I think much of their allure is that they provide an answer in a world seemingly bereft of them.
Another pleasure is derived from the fact that the reader is as busily “using her little gray cells” to solve the crime as is the detective. This is especially true in the classic “fair play” mysteries of old and of today.
“Fair play” mysteries, of course, mean that the writer gives the reader all the information the fictional detective has, thus giving us as good a chance as Poirot or Miss Marple to figure things out.
That we so often do not is due to the author’s skill at providing red herrings and through misdirection. Yes, the ink spill was shown us but the author drew our attention to the red herring of the broken pocket watch. That kind of thing.
The “interview” part of many mystery novels, when the detective goes from one person connected to the victim to the next—all suspects, of course—is a time when the reader can be especially active.
We “ride along” as the detective first meets the family member or work associate of the victim. Just as in real life, we are convinced that first impressions count, though so often, just as in real life, they don’t and we are proved wrong about a person. (The writer may take pains to deceive us in this way.) Still, the astute reader registers indications of states of mind (nervousness, bombast, defensiveness, aggression) as well as appearance as clues to character.
Now the detective begins asking questions. Here the reader is alert to emotional “tells” – reactions to certain questions or at the mention of certain other people.
And the reader-sleuth, as much as the fictional detective, takes notes of discrepancies that might point to prevarication. Or answers that point to where the character was or what they saw. All grist for the mill.
Very often, the connections may not click in until later. We might be convinced by a character’s “act,” and only later, say, “Wait a minute…how could she possibly know that, or have seen that?”
Mysteries with a Dr. Watson or Captain Hastings kind of sounding-board character have an added bonus: the added challenge of trying to figure out the crime theory of the brilliant fictional detective. For instance, Captain Hastings (whose role is to stand in for the reader) wonders, in Dumb Witnes, why Hercule Poirot insists on seeing a decorative jar in the drawing room. What can it possibly have to do with the crime? Well, read on. If we can figure out what the brilliant detective is reasoning, we are that much closer to the crime, we feel.
It’s a race to try to solve the mystery before the fictional detective reveals all at the end. I, for one, often feel I was “so close” to that aha moment of identifying the murderer. It’s why we return again and again to an art form that not only exercises our little gray cells but ties up things in a neat bow at the end— in contrast to the very messy reality we live in.
