Life's a Puzzle

The puzzle that sat unfinished on our dining table for a year before being boxed up again will be up for grabs at my book signing on November 27. (My sister did successfully complete this puzzle during the pandemic.)

An antique jigsaw puzzle determined to remain unsolved for 80 years plays a pivotal role in my upcoming novel, The Last Piece, releasing November 16. Ironically, I’ve never been a fan of jigsaw puzzles. In a wild moment of reckless abandon in 2016, I opened a thousand-piece puzzle on our dining table. I thought Hubby and I could complete it over the Christmas break and share a little bonding time in the process. A year later, the unfinished puzzle still sat on our table. We’d covered it with a tablecloth on several occasions when we needed the space. Finally, in defeat, I returned the pieces to their box. That incident, along with a fascination for seemingly random stories which all converge in the end, provided my inspiration for The Last Piece. Of course, writing the book required some digging into the history of puzzles.

John Spilsbury, a British engraver and mapmaker, is credited with inventing the first jigsaw puzzle in 1767 when he pasted a map onto wood and cut it into small pieces to be used as an educational toy. To this day, “dissected maps” continue to provide a wonderful way for children and adults to learn their geography.

In the early 1900’s, puzzles for adults emerged and became both a craze and an addiction. Pieces were cut exactly on the color lines, making them more challenging. Because the pieces did not interlock, puzzlers could wipe out an evening’s work with one false move or jostle. Nor did they provide a picture on the box, so you may not know what the subject of your masterpiece looked like until the last pieces were in place. Those early wooden puzzles proved expensive to make, too, which meant only high society folk purchased them at up to five dollars for a 500-piece puzzle (about one tenth of the monthly salary of an average worker).

Well-known game makers, the Parker Brothers, introduced interlocking puzzles that included unique “figure pieces,” where an individual piece might be shaped like an animal or other recognizable object. This added so much appeal that in 1909, Parker Brothers stopped making games and devoted their factory exclusively to puzzle production that year.

The Great Depression of the 1930’s brought even more reasons to buy and sell jigsaw puzzles. By this time, the less expensive cardboard puzzles had emerged. They offered an affordable means of entertainment and escape from difficult times. They gave strugglers something at which to succeed. Folks could rent puzzles from libraries or drugstores for pennies a day. They could pass puzzles around a community until every family had assembled it. Puzzles were also given out free with the purchase of various products. The picture would be of the product itself, doubling as advertising for the company.

Other businesses jumped on the bandwagon and began producing weekly puzzles that people rushed out to buy every Wednesday, much like a newspaper, hoping to be the first to solve that week’s jigsaw.

Once colored photography became common, jigsaw puzzles displayed more photos than artwork. With the advent of television, puzzles quickly declined in popularity. But even today, as jigsaws continue to grow in sophistication with unique challenges like 3D or double-sided, many puzzlers remain devoted to the hobby.

LOCAL FRIENDS: I’m giving away gently used jigsaw puzzles as door prizes at my come-and-go book signing at the Portage regional Library on Saturday, November 27, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. Along with all my previously released books, The Last Piece will be available for purchase. Come finish your Christmas shopping. Or, if you already own one of my books not already signed by the author, feel free to bring it along. You may go home with a new-to-you jigsaw puzzle!