read a mystery, train a brain

There's something about mystery novels. I grew up reading them constantly. Hell, I could argue that the only books I was reading for a very long period of time were mystery novels. The Boxcar Children, Encyclopedia Brown, Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie: these were my reading diet for a good chunk of my childhood. As I grew older, my tastes expanded to include other genres, but there will always be a soft spot in my heart for a good mystery. And I think that fascination with mysteries trained my brain. Because I was never just along for the ride when I read a mystery novel. No, I was actively trying to solve the case at the same time as the detective. Sometimes the author made this incredibly easy for me to do, other times it was a bit more complicated. But I was at least able to highlight suspicious elements and figure out the most likely suspects and I have not been surprised by the culprit for a very very long time. And that process trained my brain to…