The Woman Who Smashed Codes

Name: The Woman Who Smashed Codes: A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine Who Outwitted America's Enemies
Price: 14.87 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: Jason Fagone
ISBN: 9789780062430511

A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine Who Outwitted America's Enemies

In 1916, at the height of World War I, brilliant Shakespeare expert Elizebeth Smith went to work for an eccentric tycoon on his estate outside Chicago. The tycoon had close ties to the U.S. government, and he soon asked Elizebeth to apply her language skills to an exciting new venture: code-breaking. There she met the man who would become her husband, groundbreaking cryptologist William Friedman.

After World War I, Smith used her talents to catch gangsters during Prohibition, then accepted a covert mission to expose Nazi spy rings across South America. As World War II raged, Elizebeth worked cracking multiple versions of the Enigma machine used by German spies. Meanwhile, inside an Army vault in Washington, William worked furiously to break Purple, the Japanese version of Enigma — and eventually succeeded, at a terrible cost to his personal life. Jason Fagone unveils America’s code-breaking history through the prism of Smith’s life, bringing into focus the unforgettable events and colorful personalities that would help shape modern intelligence.