© 2026 Boise State Public Radio
NPR in Idaho
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Literary Puzzle Is Solved For The 1st Time In Nearly A Century

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Good morning. I'm David Greene. A complex literary puzzle has been solved for the first time in nearly a century. "Cain's Jawbone" is a murder mystery whose 100 pages are printed out of order. To make sense of the story, you have to correctly rearrange the pages. But there are 32 million combinations. John Finnemore is the man with the solution. After working on it during lockdown, he calls it, far and away the most difficult puzzle I have ever attempted. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

You make stories like this possible.

The biggest portion of Boise State Public Radio's funding comes from readers like you who value fact-based journalism and trustworthy information.

Your donation today helps make our local reporting free for our entire community.