The Woman Who Smashed Codes: A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine Who Outwitted America's Enemies

"There is nothing wrong with me. What's wrong is with other people."

I normally don't really leap on books where they make a big deal out of the main character/subject being female. I, a female, am just a person, and I don't take any special glee or pleasure out of being exalted above other people just for being what I was born. I almost passed this book up, but the subject of codebreaking was one I hadn't read about before and that was too interesting to pass up.

I'm glad I gave this a shot, because in actuality this book is about a husband/wife codebreaking duo, which I thought was more interesting than the book hinging on one person. These two were brought together by a kooky guy and his mansion of weird and wonderful experiments, she to help an older woman with her Baconian theory that Shakespeare was really Francis Bacon (incorrect) and he to produce experiments on fruit flies. They realized together that they both had an interest in solving puzzles and cracking codes, and together created the groundwork for cracking codes today. Their knowledge carried them through World War I, through catching rum runners during prohibition, and ultimately through World War II where their knowledge and mental abilities were pushed to their limits.

This was a super interesting story, and written in a way that wasn't at all confusing. The author provided ample visuals to explain some parts of the codebreaking process, and I was able to (mostly) follow along and understand the basics. Both Elizebeth and William were interesting people in their own rights.

My only minor quibble was the title. At one point in the book the author notes "The press had a way of praising Elizebeth and condescending to her at the same time, professing amazement at the capabilities of the female brain", and I kind of got that same vibe from the author with this book. These two worked together to crack all sorts of different codes, using pen and paper and their minds. The title felt phrased the way it was to sell copies, honestly.

But still, a great book, and really interesting even if you're not a codebreaker yourself.

A fair and interesting account of the two figures who laid the groundwork for wartime cryptanalysis and cryptography in America: Elizebeth and William Friedman. Without these two unusual characters, for all their own personal flaws, both World Wars likely would have ended quite differently....though the NSA also might not have been founded. A mixed legacy to be sure, fitting the somewhat mixed lives they led.

It's an interesting story full of intrigue, but unfortunately the author of this book occasionally seems to forget that, feeling the need to try to artificially inject interest by reaching for bizarre metaphors (comparing the act of decryption as opposed to simple literary analysis as reaching in and ripping words apart, leaving your "hands red and bloodied with the letters, in one example).

Still, it's a fascinating read, and a case of finally giving credit where it's properly due, despite the long-successful efforts of others (like J. Edgar Hoover) to wield confidentiality as a means of claiming credit themselves.

This is a crazy romp of a story: Elizebeth Smith, bored of women's work and afraid she'll never be taken seriously as a scholar first gets taken in by a larger than life self-made millionaire and self-declared colonel, where she joins his intentional community as one of several women looking for secret messages in the Shakespeare folios, to prove that they were indeed written by Sir Francis Bacon. However, once the Great War starts, she finds herself the only person in the country with any serious expertise in codes. So she, and her future husband forge the field of cryptanalysis. Following the war, mostly discarded by the military, she continues to work for the coast guard to decrypt coded messages by the mob as they traffic moonshine. So she is well-poised to lead the American effort when WWII truly becomes the war of codes.

Despite my obsession with the British female codebreakers of Bletchley Park, I knew less about the American side: we decrypted Engima! And defeated a bizarre secret South American-takeover plot!

If I had one complaint it's that the book to some extent sidelined her husband, William Friedman. This bothers me not just because "The Woman Who Smashed Codes: A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine who Outwitted America's Enemies And Her Husband, the Brilliant Jewish Geneticist, Who Also Smashed Codes" is EVEN more likely to be mistaken for a Markov Chain generated specifically from Becca's Interests, but also, Elizebeth and William made clear that they saw themselves as equals and I think they would have preferred it that way.

Nonetheless, this is a fascinating piece of history, well told by Fagone.