What do the authors Beatrix Potter, Rudyard Kipling, Edgar Allan Poe and the British composer Edward Elgar have in common with the Zodiac killer, Mary Queen of Scots, and an enigmatic map left in the 1880s by Virginian buffalo hunter named Thomas Beale? They all were fascinated by communicating by codes. And if you are too and want to learn how to break them yourself, you should pick up the latest expanded edition of Codebreaking by Elonka Dunin and Klaus Schmeh that is expected in September. Their book takes you through the codes used by these historical luminaries, some of them (such as one of the Zodiac messages or the mysterious Voynich manuscript) have never been broken. And there are plenty that have been solved, such as a single telegram that was decrypted and brought the US to enter WWI.

The book’s focus is on using your wits and pencil and paper to solve the puzzles for the most part, although the authors aren’t computer-adverse: they use the old fashioned methods to help develop the reader’s skills and to pay attention to the frequency distribution of the coded letters and symbols used in the messages, among other tricks of the trade that they describe in detail.

Dunin may be a familiar name to you: Years ago, I had an opportunity to meet her in person when she spoke at a conference in St. Louis. She is a very impressive person, and carries a deep history and understanding of the genre. She is tightly associated with an encoded sculpture that sits on the grounds of the CIA campus, which still contains an unsolved portion after decades of tries by the best and brightest cryptographers. Her co-author has written numerous books as well and maintains the Encrypted Books List that is a useful companion to learn more about the topic, along with providing numerous illustrations that begin each of the book’s chapters.

This is the third in the series of “fear” books featuring ex-Navy SEAL Finn in another escapade, this time in Puerto Rico in the process of saving two children who get caught up in a series of unfortunate events. Finn is trying to find the kids, who have been abducted on a snorkel trip. Meanwhile, two federales are searching for Finn and land on the island and start tracking him down. The characters, as with the previous two novels, are well drawn, the situations ultra realistic, the conflicts seemingly vexing. You don’t have to read the other books to get involved here, and if you are fans of Lee Child’s Reacher or Brad Thor’s books you will find this novel enjoyable and the pace the usual madcap and mayhem.

This book is based on the podcast/TV series of the same name which has been out for several years. The thesis is that a worldwide plague hits when people go to sleep, so the obvious conceit is to stay awake to try to fight it and figure out an antidote. So we have the real-life pandemic to compare with the fictionalized version, and that may or may not sit well with some readers. We touch on several different groups of people in everyday situations around the world as they try to cope with the calamity, which I think works better in a TV version than trying to keep track of them throughout the novel. Think of it as a zombie apocalypse without the zombies, which has never been a favorite genre for me. The novel has some terrific descriptions and the plot takes us to some interesting places. In place of the hyper-science and politics of Covid, we have just ordinary folks who are trying to live their lives and cope with staying awake. Read on Amazon here.

I have known Deb Radcliff as a B2B journalist colleague and now cyber fiction author for more than a decade. Her latest novel in the “Breaking Backbones” series can be read independent of the first volume, and is a sizzler taken directly from today’s cybersecurity news. We have mostly the same motley cast of characters of hackers, ne’er-do-wells, and tough dudes who are trying to mess up the world now that its central IT authority GlobeCom was taken down at the end of the first book. The various hacker clans are trying desperately to free a bunch of imprisoned programmers somewhere in Russia and stop the evil doers from unleashing their AI-based code on the world. In the meantime, there are plenty of drone attacks to manage, code to review, and personal scores to be settled. There is plenty of dystopia to be served up in its pages, and a great deal of verisimilitude thanks to Radcliff’s familiarity with the subject matter. Will her world be successful at freeing its digital enslavement from a crazy autocrat? Well, I won’t give away the ending, but it sure was fun reading about it.

I have known Bruce Schneier for many years, and met him most recently just after he gave one of the keynotes at this year’s RSA show. The keynote extends his thoughts in his most recent book, A Hacker’s Mind, which he wrote last year and was published this past winter. (I reviewed some of his earlier works in a blog for Avast here.)

Even if you are new to Schneier, not interested in coding, and aren’t all that technical, you should read his book because he sets out how hacking works in our everyday lives.

He chronicles how hacks pervade our society. You will hear about the term Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich (how Google and Apple and others have hacked and thus avoided paying US taxes), the exploits of the Pudding Guy (the person who hacked  American Airlines frequent flyer system by purchasing thousands of pudding cups to obtain elite status), or when the St. Louis Browns baseball team hacked things by hiring a 3’7″ batter back in 1951. There are less celebrated hacks, such as when investment firm Goldman Sachs owned a quarter of the total US aluminum supply back in the 2010’s to control its spot price. What was their hack? They moved it around several Chicago-area warehouses each day: the spot price depends on the time material is delivered. Clever, right?

Then there are numerous legislative and political hacks, such as the infamous voter literacy tests of the 1950s before the Civil Rights laws were passed. Schneier calls them “devilishly designed, selectively administered, and capriciously judged.”

“Our cognitive systems have also evolved over time,” he says, showing how they can be easily hacked, such as with agreements and contracts. This is because they can’t be made completely airtight, and we don’t really need that anyway: just the appearance of complete trust is usually enough for most purposes.

A good portion of his book concerns technology hacks, of course. He goes into details about how Facebook’s and You Tube’s algorithms are geared towards polarizing viewers, and the company not only knew this but specifically ignored the issue to optimize profits. The last chapters touch on AI issues, which he categorically says “will be used to hack us, and AI systems themselves will become the hackers” and find vulnerabilities in various social, economic and political systems. He makes a case for a hacking governance system that should be put in place — something which isn’t on the radar but should be.

“The more you can incorporate fundamental security principles into your systems design, the more secure you will be from hacking. Hacking is a balancing act. On the one hand, it is an engine of innovation. On the other, it subverts systems.” The trick is figuring out how to tip that balance.

I liked the conceit about this murder mystery novel by Hannah Mary McKinnon entitled The Revenge List: The central character attends an anger-management support group and makes a list of people who have wronged her in the past and to whom she should forgive. Trouble is, the list falls into the wrong hands and people start having grave accidents. The mystery is who is doing these dastardly deeds, and what does this have to do with the character’s flaws, which are many. The action takes place in and around Portland Maine and the supporting cast is engaging and just quirky enough to sustain the plot points. It makes you question your own attitude towards forgiveness and how we resolve issues with our past connections. The family dynamics are also very true-to-life, which adds to the novel’s credibility and complexity. Highly recommended.

This is the third book in a series of mystery novels featuring Zane Clearwater, a character who has had a shady past. It can be read independently of the others and there is a fourth is in the works. The story centers on Clearwater’s family, including a gun-packing grandmother and a private detective who comes to the aid of the family to stop a revengeful assailant who starts out in prison at the story’s beginning. Lipinski’s descriptive prose is first-rate, and the various characters are well drawn, with some very realistic challenges in their lives. By the end of the book you will feel that you know them and have a lot of empathy for their circumstances. Fans of mystery novels will enjoy this book, and I highly recommend it.

Buy it from Amazon here.

I really enjoyed this new novel which has characters and a plot line I found appealing, as a full time freelance writer for many decades.

The story is about a famous novelist and his ne’er-do-well daughter who is in her mid 30s, trying to figure out her life and try to finish her first book, which seems to have been started ages ago. It is set against the death of her mom, and interwoven we are privy to the draft of a novel (which plays an important role in the character’s lives without giving away any spoilers). The description of literary life in NYC and all its trappings and ridiculousness resonated with me, as do the challenges of 30-somethings.

The novel concerns the relationship of the famous writer to his wife and daughter, how the three of them collaborated on various projects, and the perception of the dad towards his family members. That is about all I can say in this review, but it is deliciously wicked, real, and poignant. Being related to the writer and enduring his oversize ego drives many of the plot points along. At one point the daughter feels that “writing was like being on a submarine, where she spent years being submerged, silent and secret, working toward the day where she would have something to show for all her time underwater.” The novel is interesting, amusing, and thoughtful and I highly recommend it.