Singh, Simon. The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography. New York: Anchor Books, 1999.
My first September book and I started it a little late. I think it got to me by September 8th.
Much like how Mark Kurlansky makes a subject like salt interesting, Simon Singh makes all things code fascinating. From the very beginning The Code Book was informative and interesting. Peppered with photographs and diagrams, The Code Bookrecounted the events in history where the ability to break a code (or not) meant life or death. Beginning with Queen Mary of Scot’s attempted plot to murder Queen Elizabeth on through the first and second World Wars. The only time I really got bogged down was, of course, when Singh would get a little too detailed with mathematical explanations of more difficult codes and ciphers.
Love love love this line (from the introduction): “The only people who are in a position to point out my errors are also those who are not at liberty to reveal them” (p xvii). Brilliant!
Another good line: “This was clearly a period of history that tolerated a certain lack of urgency” (p 5). This sentence doesn’t make such sense as is. What I need to explain is that during the period of 480 B.C. secret messages were written on the shaved scalps of messengers. To disguise the message there was a waiting period while the messenger’s hair grew back in. I wish I could have told my nephew this story! He would have loved the idea of being a spy (see below)!
BookLust Twist: More Book Lust in the chapter, “Codes and Ciphers” (p 50), and in the introduction as an off-hand mention (p xi).
~*LunaSea*~ 