The Cracking Code Book

How to make it, break it, hack it, crack it.
The secret history of codes and code breaking.

Simon Singh’s best-selling title The Code Book now re-issued for the young-adult market.

The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography.

Simon Singh brings life to an amazing story of puzzles, codes, languages and riddles – revealing the continual pursuit to disguise and uncover, and to work out the secret languages of others.

Codes have influenced events throughout history, both in the stories of those who make them and those who break them. The betrayal of Mary Queen of Scots and the cracking of the enigma code that helped the Allies in World War II are major episodes in a continuing history of cryptography. In addition to stories of intrigue and warfare, Simon Singh also investigates other codes, the unravelling of genes and the rediscovery of ancient languages and most tantalisingly, the Beale ciphers, an unbroken code that could hold the key to a $20 million treasure.

Reviews

The Code Book
‘…fascinating … replete with tales of intrigue, political chicanery, military secrecy and academic rivalry.’ The Irish Times

‘A Great Book.’ Observer

Fermat’s Last Theorem
‘If you enjoyed Dava Sobel’s Longitude you will enjoy this.’ Evening Standard

‘Far from being a dry textbook it reads like the chronicle of an obsessive love affair. It has the classic ingredients that Hollywood would recognise.’ Daily Mail

About the author

Simon Singh is an author, science journalist and TV producer. Having completed his PhD at Cambridge he worked from 1991 to 1997 at the BBC producing Tomorrow’s World and co-directing the BAFTA award-winning documentary Fermat’s Last Theorem for the Horizon series. In 1997, he published Fermat’s Last Theorem, which was a best-seller in Britain and translated into 22 languages.