Codes and Codecracking Intrude Increasingly In Our Daily Lives
 

Codebreaker, The History of Codes and Ciphers, From The Ancient Pharaohs To Quantum Cryptography, (New York: 2006), Walker & Company, is Stephen Pincock's slick, short, coffee table account of the subject. This book would grace any living room or library. It is printed on heavyweight coated stock and it is full of high-resolution photographs. It is not a textbook. Quite the opposite: It is a book for the amateur. It touches gracefully and lightly upon its multi-faceted subject area without ever delving too deeply into any of its many tantalizing nooks and crannies. For the young at heart, it also offers examples of several codes and ciphers that one can try one's hand at to see if there is a real cryptanalyst within.

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