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Enigma
A member of a top-secret team of British cryptographers, Tom Jericho succeeds in cracking "Shark," the impenetrable operational cipher used by Nazi U-boats, but when the Germans change the code, Jericho must break the new code before the traitor among his group can stop him.
374 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published September 11, 1995
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About the author
Robert Harris
55books8,038followersROBERT HARRIS is the author of nine best-selling novels: Fatherland, Enigma, Archangel, Pompeii, Imperium, The Ghost Writer, Conspirata, The Fear Index, and An Officer and a Spy. Several of his books have been adapted to film, most recently The Ghost Writer, directed by Roman Polanski. His work has been translated into thirty-seven languages. He lives in the village of Kintbury, England, with his wife, Gill Hornby.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 856 reviews
January 11, 2024
Robert Harris - image from BBC Radio
Set in the out-of-the-way English town of Bletchley, this is a fictionalized view of the British WW II code-breaking enterprise that cracked the German code scheme named Enigma. Tom Jericho is a whiz code breaker who was a crucial player in breaking the original Enigma code. But the effort cost him. Just recovering from a breakdown and a broken heart, he is brought back into the code-breaking effort. The Germans are making it tough on the Brits, changing aspects of their coding process to keep one step ahead of the codebreakers and their new-fangled computing machines. But there is mystery afoot. Chunks of data have gone missing. Tom’s ex girlfriend seems to be making the rounds of all the men on the project. What’s up with that? With a major floating convoy about to head from the USA to beleaguered European Allies, offering a wealth of targets for eager German u- boats, it is critical that the latest German code changes be broken. The action heats up when Tom discovers some missing files in an unexpected place. Who can be trusted?
Image from the film via IMDB
That we know how it all turns out in the end in the larger picture takes something away from potential tension. But Harris offers us a more detailed picture of the Enigma project, making it clear that this was not a single code breaking, but a process, an ongoing enterprise. It also looks at some of the very difficult decisions that had to be made to keep secret the fact that the code had been broken. And we learn a bit about the relationship between the UK and the USA during the war. However, while it is adult and enjoyable, I found it a less than completely satisfying read. I was just never drawn in to the plight of the characters enough to care a whole lot. Still, it offers an interesting look at a crucial aspect of the war and is worth a look for that alone.
The book was made into a 2001 film with the same name. It was an award winner for Kate Winslet and director Michael Apted. It received a 72-critics/55-audience rating on rotten Tomatoes.
Other Robert Harris books I have read and reviewed
-----Fatherland
-----The Ghost>
April 14, 2019
What a book! An excellent read for the ŷ Mystery and Thriller Week (April, 2019)!
Robert Harris is a gifted storyteller and his books never disappoint.
Anyway let us come to the review now. Enigma takes us to the arcane world of cryptographers working tirelessly at Bletchley Park in Britain during the World War II. Alan Turing’s legendary computing project to break the German Enigma code forms the background of the novel. When we think about wars we usually remember Generals and soldiers, but cryptographers had played a pivotal role in tilting the war in favour of the Allied Forces.
The author is a master at creating authentic atmosphere � no points for guessing that he has done a remarkable job of describing the milieu of Bletchley Park and war-ravaged Britain.
Our protagonist, Tom Jericho, is a brilliant mathematician and expert at cracking codes. He is also fantastic at solving crosswords, and also enjoys Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie novels. A very good choice of books for entertainment in my opinion!
Jericho is recovering from a nervous breakdown following his breakup with his girlfriend. But, yes you have guessed it - he is called back again. Something serious is afoot! Upon returning he finds that his ex-girlfriend is missing and Jericho suspects that there is a spy amongst them. Thus, Jericho begins his investigation aided by a very unlikely ally.
Sit back and enjoy the show! There are no James Bond-ish actions but you have an immensely enjoyable cerebral mystery. The atmosphere of mystery and tension would grip you from the start, well-fleshed out characters would enhance the reading experience, and some superb twists and turns would satisfy the thriller/mystery lover in you.
Some reviewers found the details around the technical descriptions of cryptography a bit tedious. But, this novel revolves around Enigma � I felt that the descriptions actually added a dose of authenticity.
Those who have read (if you haven’t yet read it I urge you to do so) by the same author would know that a comparison between the two books is inevitable! In fact some reviewers have found this book a notch below Fatherland.
In my humble opinion, both the books are excellent in their own right and very different from each other. Instead of comparing the two let us appreciate the merits of both.
Highly recommended to all thriller lovers! Not only this one � but Fatherland as well. �
Robert Harris is a gifted storyteller and his books never disappoint.
Anyway let us come to the review now. Enigma takes us to the arcane world of cryptographers working tirelessly at Bletchley Park in Britain during the World War II. Alan Turing’s legendary computing project to break the German Enigma code forms the background of the novel. When we think about wars we usually remember Generals and soldiers, but cryptographers had played a pivotal role in tilting the war in favour of the Allied Forces.
The author is a master at creating authentic atmosphere � no points for guessing that he has done a remarkable job of describing the milieu of Bletchley Park and war-ravaged Britain.
Our protagonist, Tom Jericho, is a brilliant mathematician and expert at cracking codes. He is also fantastic at solving crosswords, and also enjoys Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie novels. A very good choice of books for entertainment in my opinion!
Jericho is recovering from a nervous breakdown following his breakup with his girlfriend. But, yes you have guessed it - he is called back again. Something serious is afoot! Upon returning he finds that his ex-girlfriend is missing and Jericho suspects that there is a spy amongst them. Thus, Jericho begins his investigation aided by a very unlikely ally.
Sit back and enjoy the show! There are no James Bond-ish actions but you have an immensely enjoyable cerebral mystery. The atmosphere of mystery and tension would grip you from the start, well-fleshed out characters would enhance the reading experience, and some superb twists and turns would satisfy the thriller/mystery lover in you.
Some reviewers found the details around the technical descriptions of cryptography a bit tedious. But, this novel revolves around Enigma � I felt that the descriptions actually added a dose of authenticity.
Those who have read (if you haven’t yet read it I urge you to do so) by the same author would know that a comparison between the two books is inevitable! In fact some reviewers have found this book a notch below Fatherland.
In my humble opinion, both the books are excellent in their own right and very different from each other. Instead of comparing the two let us appreciate the merits of both.
Highly recommended to all thriller lovers! Not only this one � but Fatherland as well. �
September 24, 2019
Enigma: the Nazis� unbreakable encryption machine used to send coded messages throughout their armed forces. Secretly broken by the Allies and monitored by the geniuses at Bletchley Park, England, the Nazis� suspicions lead them to change Enigma’s settings so that the Allies find themselves locked out in the winter of 1943 - just as an immense fleet leaves New York with precious supplies for the Allied war effort. The convoy is headed into North Atlantic waters teeming with U-Boats and no idea of where they are. It’s down to Bletchley’s finest to find a way back into Enigma in just a few days � except the last time they got back into Enigma took them ten months! Leading the charge is wicked smaht mathematician Tom Jericho, recovering from a nervous breakdown and a broken heart. But just as the Allies find themselves locked out of Enigma, Tom’s sweetheart, Claire Romilly, also working at Bletchley, goes missing along with some codes � are the two connected; was Claire a Nazi spy?
I really enjoyed Robert Harris� second novel, Enigma. It helps that, like a lot of people, I’m fascinated by WW2 and in particular the collection of oddballs working at the top secret Bletchley Park installation, especially Alan Turing, who cameos briefly and is essentially the real life person the fictional Tom Jericho is based upon. But Harris is an exceptionally gifted writer and storyteller too who’s on top form here.
Harris masterfully blends fact and fiction in his novel. The Battle of the Atlantic, the Allies being locked out of Enigma in the winter/spring of 1943, Bletchley and the codebreaking team’s work � these remarkable events all really happened. The Claire Romilly stuff was made up though espionage during this time was of course a reality. As a result, Enigma is a very informative read and Harris skilfully brings this era vividly to life for his audience.
Jericho is clearly at least partially a portrait of Alan Turing, a key figure in the development of modern computing and perhaps most famous for his theories on AI with his Turing test, and someone I find fascinating, so it was very interesting to see how Harris wrote this clearly troubled genius as he stumbled his way through the increasingly intricate plot. And it is a complex plot but credit to Harris for never making it as indecipherable to follow for the reader as any of the codes poor Tom and his team have to grapple with. I was so impressed that even up to the final chapter there were still surprises left in the narrative.
So why not a flawless rating? Some aspects felt off. The lack of compelling characters, despite the large cast � Jericho’s the only one that really stood out to me � and the story not maintaining a consistently fast pace due to an abundance of detail. The Battle of the Atlantic storyline was much more interesting to me than the Claire storyline so it was disappointing that just as the former was getting exciting that Harris chose to drop it, never to revisit it again and only references its conclusion briefly towards the end, instead focusing on the Claire storyline exclusively. I understand why he did that but one storyline definitely suffers with comparison to the other.
On the whole though I would heartily recommend Enigma as a very entertaining and impressively researched historical fiction from one of the best British writers working today.
I really enjoyed Robert Harris� second novel, Enigma. It helps that, like a lot of people, I’m fascinated by WW2 and in particular the collection of oddballs working at the top secret Bletchley Park installation, especially Alan Turing, who cameos briefly and is essentially the real life person the fictional Tom Jericho is based upon. But Harris is an exceptionally gifted writer and storyteller too who’s on top form here.
Harris masterfully blends fact and fiction in his novel. The Battle of the Atlantic, the Allies being locked out of Enigma in the winter/spring of 1943, Bletchley and the codebreaking team’s work � these remarkable events all really happened. The Claire Romilly stuff was made up though espionage during this time was of course a reality. As a result, Enigma is a very informative read and Harris skilfully brings this era vividly to life for his audience.
Jericho is clearly at least partially a portrait of Alan Turing, a key figure in the development of modern computing and perhaps most famous for his theories on AI with his Turing test, and someone I find fascinating, so it was very interesting to see how Harris wrote this clearly troubled genius as he stumbled his way through the increasingly intricate plot. And it is a complex plot but credit to Harris for never making it as indecipherable to follow for the reader as any of the codes poor Tom and his team have to grapple with. I was so impressed that even up to the final chapter there were still surprises left in the narrative.
So why not a flawless rating? Some aspects felt off. The lack of compelling characters, despite the large cast � Jericho’s the only one that really stood out to me � and the story not maintaining a consistently fast pace due to an abundance of detail. The Battle of the Atlantic storyline was much more interesting to me than the Claire storyline so it was disappointing that just as the former was getting exciting that Harris chose to drop it, never to revisit it again and only references its conclusion briefly towards the end, instead focusing on the Claire storyline exclusively. I understand why he did that but one storyline definitely suffers with comparison to the other.
On the whole though I would heartily recommend Enigma as a very entertaining and impressively researched historical fiction from one of the best British writers working today.
October 6, 2016
An excellent historical novel based on the incredible actual story of Bletchley Park and the decrypting of the Enigma codes used by the Germans before and during WWII. This was of particular interest to me because we visited Bletchley this past summer and could appreciate the well described horrible physical conditions under which so much valuable work was carried out. Also, the breaking of the Enigma codes by Polish mathematicians, acknowledged only decades later by the Brits, is an important plot element in the sequel to A FLOOD OF EVIL which I am currently writing ...
January 30, 2025
„Енигма� е много добър исторически трилър! В него става дума за любопитните и напрегнати събития в Блечли Парк в Англия по време на Втората световна война. Там английски учени трябва да намерят начин, по който да разкрият тайните на германските военни, като тяхната дейност се оказва от важно значение за развръзката на войната.
„З� да държат под око онова сборище от чудаци, тъй важни за победата над Германия, но същевременно тъй чужди на разузнавателната традиция; всъщност унищожители на тази традиция, превръщащи онова, което е било изкуство - или ако щете, игра за джентълмени - в масово производство.�
„З� да държат под око онова сборище от чудаци, тъй важни за победата над Германия, но същевременно тъй чужди на разузнавателната традиция; всъщност унищожители на тази традиция, превръщащи онова, което е било изкуство - или ако щете, игра за джентълмени - в масово производство.�
March 29, 2025
Entre 3 y 3,5⭐️
No es lo mejor que ha escrito de Harris. Se deja leer, pero es de esos casos en los que me gustó más la película.
La acción se sitúa en 1943 en Bletchley Park, la instalación militar en la que Alan Turing y sus colaboradores descifraron los códigos utilizados por los alemanes mediante la máquina Enigma.
A su favor la trama, bien llevada, que tiene su dosis de intriga, personajes bien trazados y unas muy buenas ambientación y documentación. El hecho de que los mensajes que aparecen en la novela sean reales supone un plus.
En su contra, que se pierde en exceso con detalles y más detalles sobre los códigos lo que ralentiza la acción.
Poco más se puede decir. La novela está bien planteada en cuanto a trama, pero adolece de un ritmo irregular. Aun así no es mala lectura. Que cada cual decida.
No es lo mejor que ha escrito de Harris. Se deja leer, pero es de esos casos en los que me gustó más la película.
La acción se sitúa en 1943 en Bletchley Park, la instalación militar en la que Alan Turing y sus colaboradores descifraron los códigos utilizados por los alemanes mediante la máquina Enigma.
A su favor la trama, bien llevada, que tiene su dosis de intriga, personajes bien trazados y unas muy buenas ambientación y documentación. El hecho de que los mensajes que aparecen en la novela sean reales supone un plus.
En su contra, que se pierde en exceso con detalles y más detalles sobre los códigos lo que ralentiza la acción.
Poco más se puede decir. La novela está bien planteada en cuanto a trama, pero adolece de un ritmo irregular. Aun así no es mala lectura. Que cada cual decida.
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July 15, 2021
I read this book when it was first published as a paperback and the story today, twenty years later, is as interesting as it was then, but the circumstances surrounding the story seem scarier now than they were. The horrors of Hitler and WWII seem magnified by the passing of time and one can only wonder what the world would be like today if the hundreds of dedicated folks at Bletchley Park had not cracked the Enigma Code and, more importantly, had not been able to keep that fact a secret from the Axis powers. The writing is somewhat dry, lacking enough spritz to give it some life despite the "do we have a spy in our midst" and "furtive sex down behind the barracks" efforts of Harris to inject some life into what is a fairly mundane group of main characters. Based on lots of super-brainy real-life Oxford dons, physicists, mathematicians, cross-word puzzle writers and solvers and the like, they were just as boring as you would imagine them to be. That they conceived and built massively complex mechanical and eventually electronic forerunners to the modern-day computer seems less of a surprise than it was when I first read Enigma by Robert Harris. 3.5 stars.
November 7, 2022
Great story about a spy in Bletchley Park.
April 5, 2025
В този ранен свой роман Харис е във върхова форма, която значително се губи в последните му заглавия.
Нацистките шифри и тяхната непробиваема Енигма, криптоаналитиците от Блечли парк, предвестникът на компютрите и милионите човешки животи, разпилени безмислено из урагана на втората световна война са маркерите за няколко инфарктни дни през 1943 г. В строго секретния Блечли парк се опитват отчаяно да разбият тайната на Енигма, а междувременно изчезват класифицирани шифровани радиограми и се разследва вероятно убийство.
Психологическата дълбочина на образите не е силната страна на Харис, но тук срещаме едно от приятните изключения - справил се в съвсем прилично, героите са симпатични, а епохата е плашещо реалистична - и някак призрачно близка. Участниците в световната драма не са се променили, още по-малко пък за добро.
Отличен трилър, пак ме сграбчи с лайтмотива “хайд� само още една страница�. Магия и обяснения в любов към науката и човешката издържливост, любопитство и почтеност напук на бушуващата лудост.
4,5⭐️
—ĔĔĔĔ�
”…същ� като шахматна задача математическото доказателство трябва да бъде изящно и да притежава три основни качества: неизбежност, неочакваност и икономичност;…трябва да прилича на просто и ясно очертано съзвездие, а не на разпръснат звезден куп нейде из Млечния път.�
May 2, 2024
I’ve got to be honest, I was really disappointed by the audio version of this book. My issues are threefold:
1. In my naivety I’d assumed the story was going to centre on Alan Turing and his work breaking codes during WWII at Bletchley Park. I hoped it would be the whole big story alive for me as I only really knew the very basics. After all, that’s what Robert Harris does, isn’t it, take real life events and add a narrative around them? But in fact, this was nothing of the sort, instead it’s was a rather insignificant fictional tale about a spy and a man who suspects that something odd is going on at BP. The only link to Turing (his name was only mentioned once - in passing - throughout the whole piece) is really the setting for the story and some background work that’s going on. The foreground story here is unconvincing and not even particularly interesting. But my bad, I suppose, as I didn’t read the blurb (I seldom do) and thus went into this one blind.
2. I usually don’t listen to abridged versions. In fact, I try to avoid them at all costs. But I couldn’t track down an unabridged version (perhaps there isn’t one) and I really wanted the immersive experience of listening to it, it’s how I imbibe most of my non-fiction (or close to non-fiction). Unfortunately, this was everything I hate about abridged versions. It was jumpy and confusing, and the character development was painfully under done.
3. The reader of this book was able enough but, perhaps because the story demanded it, the dialogue throughout was delivered in a plummy posh English accent and seemed to feature mostly inconsequential and rather camp banter between the various protagonists. It neither suited my ear nor piqued my interest. In fact, in the end, I got rather lost in the hectic scrambling around and the rather confusing chatter concerning the background code breakthrough.
I’ve saved it from a one-star rating because I did listen to it all the way through - rather hoping that something interesting would happen eventually. It never did, so two stars it is.
1. In my naivety I’d assumed the story was going to centre on Alan Turing and his work breaking codes during WWII at Bletchley Park. I hoped it would be the whole big story alive for me as I only really knew the very basics. After all, that’s what Robert Harris does, isn’t it, take real life events and add a narrative around them? But in fact, this was nothing of the sort, instead it’s was a rather insignificant fictional tale about a spy and a man who suspects that something odd is going on at BP. The only link to Turing (his name was only mentioned once - in passing - throughout the whole piece) is really the setting for the story and some background work that’s going on. The foreground story here is unconvincing and not even particularly interesting. But my bad, I suppose, as I didn’t read the blurb (I seldom do) and thus went into this one blind.
2. I usually don’t listen to abridged versions. In fact, I try to avoid them at all costs. But I couldn’t track down an unabridged version (perhaps there isn’t one) and I really wanted the immersive experience of listening to it, it’s how I imbibe most of my non-fiction (or close to non-fiction). Unfortunately, this was everything I hate about abridged versions. It was jumpy and confusing, and the character development was painfully under done.
3. The reader of this book was able enough but, perhaps because the story demanded it, the dialogue throughout was delivered in a plummy posh English accent and seemed to feature mostly inconsequential and rather camp banter between the various protagonists. It neither suited my ear nor piqued my interest. In fact, in the end, I got rather lost in the hectic scrambling around and the rather confusing chatter concerning the background code breakthrough.
I’ve saved it from a one-star rating because I did listen to it all the way through - rather hoping that something interesting would happen eventually. It never did, so two stars it is.
July 9, 2017
"Също като в шахматна задача математическото доказателство трябва да бъде изящно и да притежава три основни качества: неизбежност, неочакваност и икономичност".
Мисля че няма по-добър цитат, който да опише тази книга на Робърт Харис - тя е едновременно изящна, без излишества и натруфеност, неочаквано те грабва и неизбежно ще хареса на умния читател.
Помните ли прекрсния филм "Игра на кодове" за живота на Тюрниг с Бенедикт Къмбърбач? Ако сте останали запленени от него, непременно прочетете "Енигма" на Робърт Харис. Книгата разказва за Блечли парк - място в затънтената английска провинция, което по времето на Втората световна война е събрало най-блестящите умове на нацията, за да разкрият тайната на неразгадаемата немска кодираща машина Енигма. Самият Тюринг не е герой на романа, но неговият дух витае по страниците, а историята няма как да ви остави равнодушни. Робърт Харис е прекрасен разказвач - стегнат, обран, с чудесни сравнения и без подценяване на читателя. Първа за мен, но не и последна среща с него.
Мисля че няма по-добър цитат, който да опише тази книга на Робърт Харис - тя е едновременно изящна, без излишества и натруфеност, неочаквано те грабва и неизбежно ще хареса на умния читател.
Помните ли прекрсния филм "Игра на кодове" за живота на Тюрниг с Бенедикт Къмбърбач? Ако сте останали запленени от него, непременно прочетете "Енигма" на Робърт Харис. Книгата разказва за Блечли парк - място в затънтената английска провинция, което по времето на Втората световна война е събрало най-блестящите умове на нацията, за да разкрият тайната на неразгадаемата немска кодираща машина Енигма. Самият Тюринг не е герой на романа, но неговият дух витае по страниците, а историята няма как да ви остави равнодушни. Робърт Харис е прекрасен разказвач - стегнат, обран, с чудесни сравнения и без подценяване на читателя. Първа за мен, но не и последна среща с него.
September 28, 2017
Robert Harris followed up his brilliant debut novel 'Fatherland' with 'Enigma' set during WWII in Britain with Bletchley Park (as then top secret) code breaking facility as its backdrop and named after the German mechanical cipher (Enigma) machines.
Whilst not perhaps quite as strong or consistent as 'Fatherland' this is nevertheless an excellent historical thriller, very evocative of the era and creating a great sense of authenticity and tension throughout. Robert Harris displays his (by now) usual highly accomplished storytelling skills to great effect here.
Whilst not perhaps quite as strong or consistent as 'Fatherland' this is nevertheless an excellent historical thriller, very evocative of the era and creating a great sense of authenticity and tension throughout. Robert Harris displays his (by now) usual highly accomplished storytelling skills to great effect here.
August 27, 2018
A solid effort from Robert Harris as he once again gives us an insight into historical events. I couldn't give anymore than two stars because it didn't blow me away like Fatherland did. It was just good. My only gripe is the amount of info dumping he fits into some of his chapters. Sometimes it's code breaking language overload!
July 16, 2024
2018
I’ve just re-read this inadvertently, thought the plot was familiar but then I might have seen a film adaptation, and in any event I’m familiar with the Enigma story.
Again I’d give it 3.5, but it was a perfect quick read in between some solid stuff.
No mental effort required.
2013
It's a while since I read a WWII spy thriller, and this one has a nice twist. I'd give it 3.5 if the half marks were possible. The world at Bletchley is portrayed in a way that leaves vivid images of hectic activity, bleak cold, brilliance and tedium. The plot is a bit creakybut Harris keeps the action moving along.
I’ve just re-read this inadvertently, thought the plot was familiar but then I might have seen a film adaptation, and in any event I’m familiar with the Enigma story.
Again I’d give it 3.5, but it was a perfect quick read in between some solid stuff.
No mental effort required.
2013
It's a while since I read a WWII spy thriller, and this one has a nice twist. I'd give it 3.5 if the half marks were possible. The world at Bletchley is portrayed in a way that leaves vivid images of hectic activity, bleak cold, brilliance and tedium. The plot is a bit creakybut Harris keeps the action moving along.
June 15, 2012
It’s my fault and not Robert Harris� that I haven’t been able to rate this novel more highly. I bought it a few years ago, on sale at the local bookstore, fresh from having read and enjoyed . From memory, having seen the movie adaptation a few years previously also influenced my purchase.
The premise is a good one: it’s an espionage story set in Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire, which during World War II was the site of the UK’s main decryption establishment. This is where ciphers generated by the German Enigma machine were decrypted. There’s a fair bit of information about code breaking in the narrative. Unfortunately, I overestimated my ability to understand the process. Harris� presumably simplified version of how it all worked went straight over my head, as did my husband’s even more simplified version. Mathematics and my brain are not a good combination, so what is arguably the most interesting aspect of the novel completely escaped me.
What was left was a moderately interesting story with characters I didn’t really care about. Towards the end I was skimming and just wanted it to be over so that I could move on to something more engaging. I feel a bit bad about this, because there’s nothing wrong with Harris� writing. In fact, his writing is pretty good and I’d be more than happy to read some more of his work. This was just the wrong novel for me. That said, I’m now interested in visiting the museum at Bletchley Park at some point. Maybe if I see an Enigma machine I'll actually understand what encryption and code breaking during WWII was all about.
September 26, 2018
Two mid-level protagonists in a closed environment, a wartime secret unearthed ... by inevitable comparison between two WWII novels, Fatherland comes out on top. I wish I liked this story better, for the Enigma background is solid, rotors spinning and women auxilaries kept in the dark as the smell of overheated circuits drifts. Also, the nerdy protagonist doesn't get the girl and The Girl isn't the hottie. Perhaps I expected a bigger impact of their actions upon the course of the war, but, as in reality, secrets can be efficiently buried again.
suggested reading:
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suggested reading:
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July 3, 2019
I'm a little bit on the fence with this, the second book, by Harris. I truly enjoyed his debut novel, and had great expectations for this one as well, especially since the subject of Ultra and Enigma are of great interest to me. But somehow, it fell just a little short.
I will not go into the plot except to say that there may be a traitor at work in Bletchely Park who could expose the secrets of the breaking of the German Enigma code, The major protagonist, Tom Jericho....and in fact all the players......are not particularly likeable and I couldn't relate to Tom's obsession with Claire, a clerk at Bletchley who has suddenly gone missing. Is she the spy or just an innocent who might have gotten caught up in a dangerous game?
Additionally, there is a plethora of coding information, some of which was a bit over my head putting me at a disadvantage with parts of the puzzle. But the dénouement was twisting and made up for some of the doubts that I had.
I will not go into the plot except to say that there may be a traitor at work in Bletchely Park who could expose the secrets of the breaking of the German Enigma code, The major protagonist, Tom Jericho....and in fact all the players......are not particularly likeable and I couldn't relate to Tom's obsession with Claire, a clerk at Bletchley who has suddenly gone missing. Is she the spy or just an innocent who might have gotten caught up in a dangerous game?
Additionally, there is a plethora of coding information, some of which was a bit over my head putting me at a disadvantage with parts of the puzzle. But the dénouement was twisting and made up for some of the doubts that I had.
November 5, 2016
Отново превъзходен Робърт Харис!
March 3, 2025
I spent 85% of the book thinking Claire was a spy and Tom was in delulu land, I was not expecting all the twists and turns. It made for a short and interesting read.
June 4, 2011
For many people, Ian Fleming summed up spy stories when he described his own James Bond books as being ‘bang, bang, bang, kiss, kiss, that sort of stuff�. But as with other genres, there is the crude and the subtle, with the best as good as many conventional novels.
On of the good ones is Enigma, by Robert Harris. Harris is an English writer, who, though not aspiring to write the sort of novel that will win a Booker prize is nevertheless an excellent craftsman who tells a clever and convincing story. He often writes history with a twist � like what if the Nazis had won the war. Most of his heroes are ordinary people caught up in extraordinary events. Most of his stories involve intrigue and cover up, but this is the only real spy story he has written.
In Enigma, Harris has interwoven fact and fiction. It is a story about the code breakers who worked at the secret Bletchley Park establishment to break the German Enigma code during World War II. Harris first thought of writing about code breaking while watching a documentary on the brilliant mathematician Alan Turing who worked at Bletchley Park. ‘I thought what a great character a code breaker would make�, he says.
It took Harris three years to write the book, as little had ever been made public about Bletchley Park and he had to track down former code breakers and personnel who were able to tell him about life there and how the code breakers had actually worked. The naval battle which plays an important part in the story is also real. Harris says he ‘tried to pick the single most dramatic short period I could find in Bletchley’s history� and chose a week in March 1943 where, briefly, the British were blacked out in reading the Shark Enigma � which was the Enigma key for the German U-boats � just as the biggest two convoys of the war left New York. ‘I took the frantic battle to get back into reading the code as the backdrop for the book� he says. The fictional story is about one of the code breakers, Tom Jericho, whose girlfriend � or rather the girl who had a brief affair with him � has disappeared, and in looking for her, he finds another mystery which points to a traitor within. Thus the story falls within the classic boundaries of the spy story genre, with Jericho, the professional intelligence collector, also acting as an amateur spy.
It is also interesting to note the link between events in the book and the recent death of the Polish President Lech Kaczynski in a plane crash when visiting Katyn, the site of a massacre of 20,000 Polish officers by the Russians during World War II, at the time blamed by the Allies on the Germans.
Harris is certainly aware of the need for a good plot. ‘My basic advice when writing� he says, ‘is to get three things happening every two pages. Keep things moving. Think about the book from beginning to end and see the key moments�. One result, he says is that ‘you don’t really hang about and develop characters too much. You don’t stop for long lyrical passages�. But he goes on ‘Having said that, there is no reason why a story shouldn’t carry a lot more freight with it. You can get at a truth as a novelist in a way that you can’t as an historian. I think you can bring things alive, the sense of fear, prickly fear, the sweat, the smell of the place and so on�. The sense of reality comes from a subtle perception of how and why things might ‘really� have happened.
There are elements of both ‘bang bang bang� and ‘kiss kiss� in Enigma. But they satisfy a different need from the sensationalism of the Bond stories. Harris relies on creating a sense of realism in which ordinary people do the best they can against real dangers, rather than relying on gadgetry and unlikely heroics against an equally unlikely fiendish enemy. It’s a different kind of spy story.
Enigma is one of those rare cases where the film (2001) is as good as the book. It was directed by Michael Apted, and stars Dougray Scott and Kate Winslet.
In his novel, Ghost, which came out in 2007, Harris turned to much more recent history. The main character is a ghost writer who is called in at short notice to tidy up the memoirs of a recently retired British Prime Minister after the ex PM’s original ghost writer is found drowned. The Prime Minister in question, named Adam Lang, is easily recognizable � Harris said he half expected a writ against him when to book was published. And of course, all is not as it seems. The book has been turned into a film by Roman Polanski under the title The Ghost Writer, starring Ewan McGregor. It premiered early in 2010.
Following Ghost, Harris has returned to the Rome of the first century BC for the second of a trilogy about Cicero. Lustrum was published in 2009. Why is ancient Rome of interest to us today? Well you never know; its decline and fall may just have some lessons for us.
On of the good ones is Enigma, by Robert Harris. Harris is an English writer, who, though not aspiring to write the sort of novel that will win a Booker prize is nevertheless an excellent craftsman who tells a clever and convincing story. He often writes history with a twist � like what if the Nazis had won the war. Most of his heroes are ordinary people caught up in extraordinary events. Most of his stories involve intrigue and cover up, but this is the only real spy story he has written.
In Enigma, Harris has interwoven fact and fiction. It is a story about the code breakers who worked at the secret Bletchley Park establishment to break the German Enigma code during World War II. Harris first thought of writing about code breaking while watching a documentary on the brilliant mathematician Alan Turing who worked at Bletchley Park. ‘I thought what a great character a code breaker would make�, he says.
It took Harris three years to write the book, as little had ever been made public about Bletchley Park and he had to track down former code breakers and personnel who were able to tell him about life there and how the code breakers had actually worked. The naval battle which plays an important part in the story is also real. Harris says he ‘tried to pick the single most dramatic short period I could find in Bletchley’s history� and chose a week in March 1943 where, briefly, the British were blacked out in reading the Shark Enigma � which was the Enigma key for the German U-boats � just as the biggest two convoys of the war left New York. ‘I took the frantic battle to get back into reading the code as the backdrop for the book� he says. The fictional story is about one of the code breakers, Tom Jericho, whose girlfriend � or rather the girl who had a brief affair with him � has disappeared, and in looking for her, he finds another mystery which points to a traitor within. Thus the story falls within the classic boundaries of the spy story genre, with Jericho, the professional intelligence collector, also acting as an amateur spy.
It is also interesting to note the link between events in the book and the recent death of the Polish President Lech Kaczynski in a plane crash when visiting Katyn, the site of a massacre of 20,000 Polish officers by the Russians during World War II, at the time blamed by the Allies on the Germans.
Harris is certainly aware of the need for a good plot. ‘My basic advice when writing� he says, ‘is to get three things happening every two pages. Keep things moving. Think about the book from beginning to end and see the key moments�. One result, he says is that ‘you don’t really hang about and develop characters too much. You don’t stop for long lyrical passages�. But he goes on ‘Having said that, there is no reason why a story shouldn’t carry a lot more freight with it. You can get at a truth as a novelist in a way that you can’t as an historian. I think you can bring things alive, the sense of fear, prickly fear, the sweat, the smell of the place and so on�. The sense of reality comes from a subtle perception of how and why things might ‘really� have happened.
There are elements of both ‘bang bang bang� and ‘kiss kiss� in Enigma. But they satisfy a different need from the sensationalism of the Bond stories. Harris relies on creating a sense of realism in which ordinary people do the best they can against real dangers, rather than relying on gadgetry and unlikely heroics against an equally unlikely fiendish enemy. It’s a different kind of spy story.
Enigma is one of those rare cases where the film (2001) is as good as the book. It was directed by Michael Apted, and stars Dougray Scott and Kate Winslet.
In his novel, Ghost, which came out in 2007, Harris turned to much more recent history. The main character is a ghost writer who is called in at short notice to tidy up the memoirs of a recently retired British Prime Minister after the ex PM’s original ghost writer is found drowned. The Prime Minister in question, named Adam Lang, is easily recognizable � Harris said he half expected a writ against him when to book was published. And of course, all is not as it seems. The book has been turned into a film by Roman Polanski under the title The Ghost Writer, starring Ewan McGregor. It premiered early in 2010.
Following Ghost, Harris has returned to the Rome of the first century BC for the second of a trilogy about Cicero. Lustrum was published in 2009. Why is ancient Rome of interest to us today? Well you never know; its decline and fall may just have some lessons for us.
April 24, 2011
The basic idea of this story, like so many of others Harris wrote, is; 'take an interesting historical period, throw in some Noir, mix, add fascinating and beautiful femme fatales to flavour'.
It's a recipe that usually works, but, just like your basic meat-and-potatoes, it's not something you'd serve for a gourmet meal unless you're a really genuinely good chef. Harris is rather more my mother throwing together a nice but not terribly inspiring dinner than the three-star restaurant serving a steak, but, hey, I don't go out to restaurants every day of my life, and my literary cuisine can use an occasional homemade plain meal.
The basic story focuses on the WWII decryption of the Germans' Enigma code; a feat which both helped win the war - perhaps singlehandedly won it - and was the root of yours truly's review sitting out here today, and you being profoundly bored by it. The time and place where electronic computing first came into being, though Harris doesn't put much emphasis on that. The protagonist is Tom Jericho, a brilliant mathematician and cryptanalyst with large amounts of hormones. He falls in love with a seemingly vapid, but admittedly gorgeous, blonde named Claire, has a nervous breakdown, breaks the Germans' code, goes away, comes back, and gets into trouble. All in about four chapters. Then things get really tangled.
Part of my problem with this book was that I'd just recently read through Collins's Woman in White, and reading Enigma rather reminded me of that mystery classic. There you had Laudanum, here you have Germans and U-Boats. Much of the rest of the plot seems like a reflection of that other book, told more succinctly, and with less appeal to diaries.
So my problems with The Woman in White, which I actually found an excellent book by and large, were neatly reflected here, as well. Of course, whereas the former was written by a well-known Victorian misogynist, Mr. Harris has no such excuse. I hope he realizes just how tired the average female reader grows of reading about the intelligent but plain woman who busily aids in the investigation being shuffled off as a potential love interest for the sake of the beautiful and feminine damsel in distress. Honestly, I get quite bored. One would think a mathematician, a person to whom his profession is everything, would be inclined to seek out a mate he could actually talk to, rather than one simply to look at. I mean, if he really needs perfect beauty to admire, he could buy a painting, right?
But no, we must follow up with the cliche. After all, if we put too much pepper in the potatoes, some bland and banal palate might not appreciate it.
And no adding any sort of odd sauce to the dish, either. The bleak, noir world of Bletchley Park - which happened to be criticized by people who were there - is the perfect grim and grimy setting for a crime; the character is a sort of traumatized and disillusioned noir detective, maths style, dismissed and later re-evoked for his brilliance. There's a scene of him losing his badge (for the Nth+1 time). The foolish supervisor is there, the obstructing bureaucrat is there, the loyal but uninspiring coworkers are there...
Mind you, the book as a concoction is not at all bad, like my mother's cooking isn't - at least, it's wonderful cooking anywhere within hearing of my mother - and it has its merits. For one, the math and cryptoanalysis is well-researched and explained. The fellow is no Stephenson, I suppose, but so far as I could tell, being a mathematician only by marital proxy rather than by inclination, he wasn't Dan Browning the whole affair.
Also, the book, although it drags at times, is eminently edible - I mean, readable - and digestible by pretty much anyone. I can't really point to a person or demographics and say 'no, don't read this'. It may not enthrall or impress you, but, really, there's very little chance that you'll throw it into the garbage bin after taking a single bite.
It's a recipe that usually works, but, just like your basic meat-and-potatoes, it's not something you'd serve for a gourmet meal unless you're a really genuinely good chef. Harris is rather more my mother throwing together a nice but not terribly inspiring dinner than the three-star restaurant serving a steak, but, hey, I don't go out to restaurants every day of my life, and my literary cuisine can use an occasional homemade plain meal.
The basic story focuses on the WWII decryption of the Germans' Enigma code; a feat which both helped win the war - perhaps singlehandedly won it - and was the root of yours truly's review sitting out here today, and you being profoundly bored by it. The time and place where electronic computing first came into being, though Harris doesn't put much emphasis on that. The protagonist is Tom Jericho, a brilliant mathematician and cryptanalyst with large amounts of hormones. He falls in love with a seemingly vapid, but admittedly gorgeous, blonde named Claire, has a nervous breakdown, breaks the Germans' code, goes away, comes back, and gets into trouble. All in about four chapters. Then things get really tangled.
Part of my problem with this book was that I'd just recently read through Collins's Woman in White, and reading Enigma rather reminded me of that mystery classic. There you had Laudanum, here you have Germans and U-Boats. Much of the rest of the plot seems like a reflection of that other book, told more succinctly, and with less appeal to diaries.
So my problems with The Woman in White, which I actually found an excellent book by and large, were neatly reflected here, as well. Of course, whereas the former was written by a well-known Victorian misogynist, Mr. Harris has no such excuse. I hope he realizes just how tired the average female reader grows of reading about the intelligent but plain woman who busily aids in the investigation being shuffled off as a potential love interest for the sake of the beautiful and feminine damsel in distress. Honestly, I get quite bored. One would think a mathematician, a person to whom his profession is everything, would be inclined to seek out a mate he could actually talk to, rather than one simply to look at. I mean, if he really needs perfect beauty to admire, he could buy a painting, right?
But no, we must follow up with the cliche. After all, if we put too much pepper in the potatoes, some bland and banal palate might not appreciate it.
And no adding any sort of odd sauce to the dish, either. The bleak, noir world of Bletchley Park - which happened to be criticized by people who were there - is the perfect grim and grimy setting for a crime; the character is a sort of traumatized and disillusioned noir detective, maths style, dismissed and later re-evoked for his brilliance. There's a scene of him losing his badge (for the Nth+1 time). The foolish supervisor is there, the obstructing bureaucrat is there, the loyal but uninspiring coworkers are there...
Mind you, the book as a concoction is not at all bad, like my mother's cooking isn't - at least, it's wonderful cooking anywhere within hearing of my mother - and it has its merits. For one, the math and cryptoanalysis is well-researched and explained. The fellow is no Stephenson, I suppose, but so far as I could tell, being a mathematician only by marital proxy rather than by inclination, he wasn't Dan Browning the whole affair.
Also, the book, although it drags at times, is eminently edible - I mean, readable - and digestible by pretty much anyone. I can't really point to a person or demographics and say 'no, don't read this'. It may not enthrall or impress you, but, really, there's very little chance that you'll throw it into the garbage bin after taking a single bite.
June 22, 2017
I like the Kate Winslet movie, so I went looking for the book it’s based on. The movie added a bit more action and romance, but otherwise it’s very close to Harris’s story. In fact, I rather wish the book had been longer and more detailed. I had assumed that the mystery was simplified for the movie, but it turns out that’s how it’s written.
The author says that while the characters are fictional, the book is set “against the background of an actual historical event� and “the German naval signals quoted in the text are all authentic�.
It’s set at Bletchley Park in 1943, just as the Germans have changed their weather codebook, meaning the British cryptanalysts can no longer decipher the encrypted U-boat communications. A convoy of ships is headed across the Atlantic from America, and the allies don’t know where the U-boats are.
Jericho, the mathematician who was instrumental in breaking the German U-boat Enigma code originally, is resting at Cambridge following a nervous breakdown caused by stress and fatigue and relationship issues with a beautiful, mysterious girl called Claire.
Jericho is summoned back to Bletchley, he finds that Claire has gone missing under suspicious circumstances, and he teams up with her roommate Hester to figure out what she was up to.
I enjoyed the book very much, although as I said, I was expecting the plot to be more complicated. There is some nice tension, and even a couple of car chases, but for the most part Jericho and Hester have little trouble gathering the bits of data they need to solve the mystery. The secondary characters are not very well fleshed out, which surprised me. I expected that we would get more background on several of them, including the guilty party.
Still, this was an engaging read. It offers a nice glimpse of wartime England: shortages, blackouts, and especially bad food - every meal Jericho eats sounds terrible. I’m fascinated by all the “girls� who worked at Bletchley.
The author says that while the characters are fictional, the book is set “against the background of an actual historical event� and “the German naval signals quoted in the text are all authentic�.
It’s set at Bletchley Park in 1943, just as the Germans have changed their weather codebook, meaning the British cryptanalysts can no longer decipher the encrypted U-boat communications. A convoy of ships is headed across the Atlantic from America, and the allies don’t know where the U-boats are.
Jericho, the mathematician who was instrumental in breaking the German U-boat Enigma code originally, is resting at Cambridge following a nervous breakdown caused by stress and fatigue and relationship issues with a beautiful, mysterious girl called Claire.
Jericho is summoned back to Bletchley, he finds that Claire has gone missing under suspicious circumstances, and he teams up with her roommate Hester to figure out what she was up to.
I enjoyed the book very much, although as I said, I was expecting the plot to be more complicated. There is some nice tension, and even a couple of car chases, but for the most part Jericho and Hester have little trouble gathering the bits of data they need to solve the mystery. The secondary characters are not very well fleshed out, which surprised me. I expected that we would get more background on several of them, including the guilty party.
Still, this was an engaging read. It offers a nice glimpse of wartime England: shortages, blackouts, and especially bad food - every meal Jericho eats sounds terrible. I’m fascinated by all the “girls� who worked at Bletchley.
December 22, 2016
It took me quite a long time to get into this book. I think I had two obstacles that I eventually overcame. Firstly, I expected the story to be focussed on the grand tale of the breaking of the Enigma machine, something like the fairly recent movie starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing. It turns out that the Enigma codes and Bletchley Park form the context for the story, which is actually a spy novel with its main focus on personal relationships. My mistake. Second thing that curbed my early enthusiasm was the author's rather abrupt jumping back and forward in time, particularly in the opening chapters. I found it disjointed and confusing.
By Chapter 4 the story began to settle and a couple of things at that stage grabbed my attention, and kept me reading. It felt familiar, and at some point I realised I was reading a spy story very much in the tradition of . It is quintessentially English - socially inept single academics with odd habits and dubious hygiene; military officers whose status is more the result of their family and school ties than their intelligence and expertise; shadowy Intelligence officers from the bowels of Whitehall; brash, duplicitous Americans...the only person missing was George Smiley!!
A quirky young mathematician, Thomas Jericho, a former colleague of Turing, returns from Kings College Cambridge to Bletchley Park, where the German Enigma cryptography system was decoded, after a nervous collapse sidelined him. He was the key individual in the breaking of the most complex and secret of the Enigma codes, and the effort damaged his physical and mental health. His convalescence has been cut short, as his brilliant mind is needed back at Bletchley when the German signals suddenly cannot be deciphered - the codes, which took so long to break, have been changed abruptly. Three huge convoys of ships have recently left New York, carrying vital supplies and nearly 10,000 people, and the German U-boats are lining up in the North Atlantic, torpedoes primed...
One of the reasons for Jericho's mental fatigue is the fate of his budding romance with the beautiful, clever Claire Romilly, a clerk in a minor role at Bletchley. Their relationship is at a hiatus after a lovers' tiff, but he is desperate to reunite with her after returning from Cambridge. However, she remains elusive. Her housemate, the rather dour Hester Wallace, is initially unhelpful, but in time becomes his ally in trying to discover Claire's whereabouts. These two 'odd bods' take some daring risks to trace Claire in secret, providing much of the suspense in this novel. I found it very hard to like the wishy-washy Thomas at first, but by the time he teamed up with Hester, he became more appealing.
The action of the novel takes place against a background of real events. I'm not sure how historically accurate Harris's depictions of the war might be, but there is a strong feeling of authenticity. It is in the minor details that the reader gets a true sense of those difficult times. The shabbily-built buildings in which thousands work on the monitoring of enemy signals are cold, dark and damp. The food is positively vomitous - cold comfort for those bright intellects on whom Churchill and his generals are relying to help them win the war. In Jericho's dingy digs at The Commercial Guesthouse, run by the formidable Mrs Armstrong, the fare is little better. It symbolises the countless petty deprivations imposed on the citizenry when England's entire national focus lay elsewhere.
Early on, I was frustrated by the seemingly slow pace of the narrative. By the end I realised the author took his time to peel away various layers of secrets. The reward for my patience was an intriguing set of disclosures, followed by more revelations, and some unexpected twists in the tale...Meanwhile, the race to re-crack the Enigma codes continues as the secondary plot line, with the ominous threat of destruction of the shipping in the Atlantic.
Overall, this book is a pleasing mystery, but hardly a nail-biting thriller. Nor is it a happy, funny story. A slow burner, it rewards the patient reader with effective closure of the plot lines, and a surprising ending.
3.5ȴ
By Chapter 4 the story began to settle and a couple of things at that stage grabbed my attention, and kept me reading. It felt familiar, and at some point I realised I was reading a spy story very much in the tradition of . It is quintessentially English - socially inept single academics with odd habits and dubious hygiene; military officers whose status is more the result of their family and school ties than their intelligence and expertise; shadowy Intelligence officers from the bowels of Whitehall; brash, duplicitous Americans...the only person missing was George Smiley!!
A quirky young mathematician, Thomas Jericho, a former colleague of Turing, returns from Kings College Cambridge to Bletchley Park, where the German Enigma cryptography system was decoded, after a nervous collapse sidelined him. He was the key individual in the breaking of the most complex and secret of the Enigma codes, and the effort damaged his physical and mental health. His convalescence has been cut short, as his brilliant mind is needed back at Bletchley when the German signals suddenly cannot be deciphered - the codes, which took so long to break, have been changed abruptly. Three huge convoys of ships have recently left New York, carrying vital supplies and nearly 10,000 people, and the German U-boats are lining up in the North Atlantic, torpedoes primed...
One of the reasons for Jericho's mental fatigue is the fate of his budding romance with the beautiful, clever Claire Romilly, a clerk in a minor role at Bletchley. Their relationship is at a hiatus after a lovers' tiff, but he is desperate to reunite with her after returning from Cambridge. However, she remains elusive. Her housemate, the rather dour Hester Wallace, is initially unhelpful, but in time becomes his ally in trying to discover Claire's whereabouts. These two 'odd bods' take some daring risks to trace Claire in secret, providing much of the suspense in this novel. I found it very hard to like the wishy-washy Thomas at first, but by the time he teamed up with Hester, he became more appealing.
The action of the novel takes place against a background of real events. I'm not sure how historically accurate Harris's depictions of the war might be, but there is a strong feeling of authenticity. It is in the minor details that the reader gets a true sense of those difficult times. The shabbily-built buildings in which thousands work on the monitoring of enemy signals are cold, dark and damp. The food is positively vomitous - cold comfort for those bright intellects on whom Churchill and his generals are relying to help them win the war. In Jericho's dingy digs at The Commercial Guesthouse, run by the formidable Mrs Armstrong, the fare is little better. It symbolises the countless petty deprivations imposed on the citizenry when England's entire national focus lay elsewhere.
Early on, I was frustrated by the seemingly slow pace of the narrative. By the end I realised the author took his time to peel away various layers of secrets. The reward for my patience was an intriguing set of disclosures, followed by more revelations, and some unexpected twists in the tale...Meanwhile, the race to re-crack the Enigma codes continues as the secondary plot line, with the ominous threat of destruction of the shipping in the Atlantic.
Overall, this book is a pleasing mystery, but hardly a nail-biting thriller. Nor is it a happy, funny story. A slow burner, it rewards the patient reader with effective closure of the plot lines, and a surprising ending.
3.5ȴ
October 14, 2021
I enjoyed this thriller set at Bletchley Park in 1943. Jericho the mathematical genius has an affair with Claire a blonde extrovert. He is responsible for breaking the enigma machine code. He has a nervous breakdown after Claire suddenly leaves him. Then he is called back to Bletchley when the Germans change the code. It is amazing the fact all German communications were being intercepted. I did not realize the scale and that sometimes it took days to decode.
Claire is not who she seems. Her friend Hester helps solve the mystery of her disappearance. The ending has a nice twist but the motivation of the traitor is for me a bit tenuous. A good read.
Claire is not who she seems. Her friend Hester helps solve the mystery of her disappearance. The ending has a nice twist but the motivation of the traitor is for me a bit tenuous. A good read.
July 8, 2017
History (World War II), mathematics and cryptography, and the enigma machine―these themes that this story is set around is what attracted my attention when I saw the book as I hadn’t read anything by Robert Harris before. Our hero, the fictional Thomas Jerrico, is a student of Alan Turing himself (Turing makes a brief appearance in the book) and trained and recruited to Bletchley Park on the naval side of things as one of those working to break the Enigma. He achieves a major breakthrough with a particularly difficult code but soon after suffers a breakdown―a result of overwork and a broken heart. He is sent back to Cambridge to recover but only a few weeks in, two men from Bletchley arrive to take him back for the success they achieved has been undone with a new code in operation. On his return, he tries to meet the girl he loved―the beautiful Claire Romilly ―but she mysteriously disappears after he only gets a brief glimpse of her. He tries to find her but ends up finding what looks like evidence that she just might have been a spy, responsible for the setback they have suffered. But was she really one? He starts to investigate aided by Claire’s housemate, and friend of sorts, Hester Wallace. Alongside, he must also try to find an answer to the new code set in a short time, something that seems even to him pretty much impossible.
This was a very enjoyable read for me both as a mystery/thriller and as historical fiction. The book is well researched and I thought the author really makes one feel the atmosphere of Bletchley―the tireless hours of work, the immense and indeed intense pressure on the cryptologists, the talented women who are not employed in tasks that recognise their work, and the countless others, day after day performing almost mechanical tasks for hours each day, some just wanting reassurance that what they’re doing is worthwhile, and of some value. The mystery itself―not quite a whodunit―was also interesting and enjoyable though it, may be, picked up more pace in the second half. However, it was overall a gripping read with some surprises right until the very end. Four and a half stars.
This was a very enjoyable read for me both as a mystery/thriller and as historical fiction. The book is well researched and I thought the author really makes one feel the atmosphere of Bletchley―the tireless hours of work, the immense and indeed intense pressure on the cryptologists, the talented women who are not employed in tasks that recognise their work, and the countless others, day after day performing almost mechanical tasks for hours each day, some just wanting reassurance that what they’re doing is worthwhile, and of some value. The mystery itself―not quite a whodunit―was also interesting and enjoyable though it, may be, picked up more pace in the second half. However, it was overall a gripping read with some surprises right until the very end. Four and a half stars.
May 6, 2021
A good historical novel concerning code breaking during WWII. I was an analyst for the Air Force Security Service during the sixties and some of this is familiar, although the 60's security was much tighter. A good story and quite interesting, at least to me. Recommended.
August 18, 2016
Masterful storytelling...
It's 1943, and the Allies rely on the shipping convoys from the US to keep their battered countries fed and munitioned. The tide has been flowing in the Allies favour since the German Enigma codes were broken at Bletchley Park in the South of England. But now the Germans have changed the U-boat code, threatening not only individual convoys but the entire defeat of the Allied forces. Tom Jericho, hailed as one of the most brilliant codebreakers, is on a break, suffering from a combination of stress, overwork and a broken heart over a girl named Claire. But with this new threat, despite his fragile health, he's urgently needed back in Bletchley. And when he gets there, he discovers Claire is missing...
What a joy, after a series of less than stellar reads, to find myself in the safe hands of a master storyteller once again! This is a masterclass in how to write a book. The writing is so good it hooks instantly. Harris recreates wartime Britain with what feels like total authenticity; and specifically the world of these men, recruited for their brilliant minds, their maths and puzzle solving skills, on whose youthful shoulders it sometimes feels the whole weight of the war rests. Throughout the book, Harris feeds out his extensive research into Bletchley and codebreaking at the right moments and in the right quantities, as a natural part of the story so that it never feels like an info dump. He carefully creates his characters to feel real and then ensures their actions remain true to that characterisation. And oh, bliss! The book has an actual plot � a proper story, that remains credible throughout and holds the reader's attention right to the end! The pleasure of reading this well-crafted, expertly-paced story highlighted to me what a rarity that has become in contemporary fiction.
The book starts in Cambridge University, where Jericho has been sent to recuperate. The whole feeling of the ancient university in wartime is beautifully created, setting the tone for the rest of the book. The old staircases and shabby rooms, the ancient traditions; the dullness of an institution empty of so many of the young men and women who would normally have been there, but who are instead part of the war effort; the gossiping staff with too much time on their hands, speculating about the arrival of this young man and then his sudden departure; the difficult position of young men not in uniform, but whose work is too secret to be revealed.
On arriving back at Bletchley, Jericho finds that two convoys have left the US and are crossing the Atlantic. The Americans want assurances that the codes will be broken quickly enough to allow for these convoys to be protected, but Jericho sees no hope of that. Instead, he believes that by monitoring the signals of the U-boats that will be aiming towards the convoys, he might gather enough information to break the codes. Harris shows very clearly the ethical dilemmas the young codebreakers must face � they find themselves almost hoping for the convoys to be attacked so that they can get the information they need. Harris also raises the point that it was often necessary not to act on the information gathered from Enigma so that the Germans wouldn't realise the codes had been broken and change them. Thus many Allied lives were sacrificed in the hopes of saving many more by eventually winning the war. He doesn't labour these points in a heavy-handed way, but he uses them to show the almost unbearable levels of stress the codebreakers worked under, coupled with the necessary secrecy of the work which left them somewhat detached from the rest of society, in a little bubble of constant tension.
No wonder then that suspicion was never absent, the fear of spying a real and present threat. So when Jericho discovers something that forces him to question Claire's loyalty, he is torn. His head knows he should make the authorities aware of what he's found, but his heart wants to find her and give her an opportunity to explain. And soon he finds himself teamed up with Claire's old house-mate, Hester, backtracking through Claire's actions in an attempt to find explanations.
The plot gives Harris the opportunity to gradually lead the reader through how the whole set-up worked, from the soldiers and sailors risking their lives to get hold of code books, to the listening stations on the South Coast where the women of the ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service) intercepted the coded German signals, and on to the huts in Bletchley, each responsible for an aspect of the war; Eastern Front, naval manoeuvres, etc. Harris shows how women were restricted to being glorified clerks, regardless of their skills or aptitude, while only men were given the more glamorous job of the actual code-breaking. But his few female characters are excellently drawn, strong and credible within the limitations the system forced upon them. The stuff about the codebreaking is complex, sometimes too complex for me, but the story doesn't get bogged down in it. As with all of the best spy thrillers, there is a growing sense of moral ambiguity throughout, where even the motives of the baddies are equivocal.
A first rate spy thriller, written with all the qualities of literary fiction, this one gets my highest recommendation.
It's 1943, and the Allies rely on the shipping convoys from the US to keep their battered countries fed and munitioned. The tide has been flowing in the Allies favour since the German Enigma codes were broken at Bletchley Park in the South of England. But now the Germans have changed the U-boat code, threatening not only individual convoys but the entire defeat of the Allied forces. Tom Jericho, hailed as one of the most brilliant codebreakers, is on a break, suffering from a combination of stress, overwork and a broken heart over a girl named Claire. But with this new threat, despite his fragile health, he's urgently needed back in Bletchley. And when he gets there, he discovers Claire is missing...
What a joy, after a series of less than stellar reads, to find myself in the safe hands of a master storyteller once again! This is a masterclass in how to write a book. The writing is so good it hooks instantly. Harris recreates wartime Britain with what feels like total authenticity; and specifically the world of these men, recruited for their brilliant minds, their maths and puzzle solving skills, on whose youthful shoulders it sometimes feels the whole weight of the war rests. Throughout the book, Harris feeds out his extensive research into Bletchley and codebreaking at the right moments and in the right quantities, as a natural part of the story so that it never feels like an info dump. He carefully creates his characters to feel real and then ensures their actions remain true to that characterisation. And oh, bliss! The book has an actual plot � a proper story, that remains credible throughout and holds the reader's attention right to the end! The pleasure of reading this well-crafted, expertly-paced story highlighted to me what a rarity that has become in contemporary fiction.
The book starts in Cambridge University, where Jericho has been sent to recuperate. The whole feeling of the ancient university in wartime is beautifully created, setting the tone for the rest of the book. The old staircases and shabby rooms, the ancient traditions; the dullness of an institution empty of so many of the young men and women who would normally have been there, but who are instead part of the war effort; the gossiping staff with too much time on their hands, speculating about the arrival of this young man and then his sudden departure; the difficult position of young men not in uniform, but whose work is too secret to be revealed.
On arriving back at Bletchley, Jericho finds that two convoys have left the US and are crossing the Atlantic. The Americans want assurances that the codes will be broken quickly enough to allow for these convoys to be protected, but Jericho sees no hope of that. Instead, he believes that by monitoring the signals of the U-boats that will be aiming towards the convoys, he might gather enough information to break the codes. Harris shows very clearly the ethical dilemmas the young codebreakers must face � they find themselves almost hoping for the convoys to be attacked so that they can get the information they need. Harris also raises the point that it was often necessary not to act on the information gathered from Enigma so that the Germans wouldn't realise the codes had been broken and change them. Thus many Allied lives were sacrificed in the hopes of saving many more by eventually winning the war. He doesn't labour these points in a heavy-handed way, but he uses them to show the almost unbearable levels of stress the codebreakers worked under, coupled with the necessary secrecy of the work which left them somewhat detached from the rest of society, in a little bubble of constant tension.
No wonder then that suspicion was never absent, the fear of spying a real and present threat. So when Jericho discovers something that forces him to question Claire's loyalty, he is torn. His head knows he should make the authorities aware of what he's found, but his heart wants to find her and give her an opportunity to explain. And soon he finds himself teamed up with Claire's old house-mate, Hester, backtracking through Claire's actions in an attempt to find explanations.
The plot gives Harris the opportunity to gradually lead the reader through how the whole set-up worked, from the soldiers and sailors risking their lives to get hold of code books, to the listening stations on the South Coast where the women of the ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service) intercepted the coded German signals, and on to the huts in Bletchley, each responsible for an aspect of the war; Eastern Front, naval manoeuvres, etc. Harris shows how women were restricted to being glorified clerks, regardless of their skills or aptitude, while only men were given the more glamorous job of the actual code-breaking. But his few female characters are excellently drawn, strong and credible within the limitations the system forced upon them. The stuff about the codebreaking is complex, sometimes too complex for me, but the story doesn't get bogged down in it. As with all of the best spy thrillers, there is a growing sense of moral ambiguity throughout, where even the motives of the baddies are equivocal.
A first rate spy thriller, written with all the qualities of literary fiction, this one gets my highest recommendation.
February 17, 2025
Enigma
Novela ambientada en la segunda guerra mundial con el mundo del espionaje y el cifrado de mensajes como protagonista.
La historia está basada en hechos reales. La máquina Enigma era la herramienta de los alemanes para comunicarse con sus submarinos.
Cuenta como un grupo de genios de las matemáticas intenta descifrar los mensajes que envía Enigma.
Aunque los personajes son ficticios, los mensajes publicados en la novela son reales.
Tiene como principal protagonista a Tom Jericho el principal descifrador del código. Este hombre se encuentra descansando después del esfuerzo tremendo que le supuso encontrar la clave. Pero es vuelto a llamar porque han cambiado la forma de transmitir con Enigma.
Se hizo una película de esta novela, aunque no la he visto puede estar bien. El libro está bien, lo malo es que te pierdes con tanto código. Lo que está mejor es la intriga que hay alrededor de los descifradores. Un tanto sorprendente, pero era la guerra y había espías en todas partes.
Novela ambientada en la segunda guerra mundial con el mundo del espionaje y el cifrado de mensajes como protagonista.
La historia está basada en hechos reales. La máquina Enigma era la herramienta de los alemanes para comunicarse con sus submarinos.
Cuenta como un grupo de genios de las matemáticas intenta descifrar los mensajes que envía Enigma.
Aunque los personajes son ficticios, los mensajes publicados en la novela son reales.
Tiene como principal protagonista a Tom Jericho el principal descifrador del código. Este hombre se encuentra descansando después del esfuerzo tremendo que le supuso encontrar la clave. Pero es vuelto a llamar porque han cambiado la forma de transmitir con Enigma.
Se hizo una película de esta novela, aunque no la he visto puede estar bien. El libro está bien, lo malo es que te pierdes con tanto código. Lo que está mejor es la intriga que hay alrededor de los descifradores. Un tanto sorprendente, pero era la guerra y había espías en todas partes.
November 11, 2021
Read this book in 2009, and its a standalone book about the Secret Service of Decoding.
This tale is set in the year 1943, and Tom Jericho and his team of cryptanalysts have broken the Enigma code of Hitler's U-boats.
All of a sudden a woman disappears, and that the question is, is she a traitor or is someone else a spy within this team.
When suspicion also falls on Tom Jericho himself, he knows that he has only option left, and that's the find the traitor by himself and unmask that person.
What is to follow is a very exciting and gripping historical WWII adventure about the Enigma code and what it can achieve, and in this environment of WWII, Tom Jericho must seem to survive the dangers when pursuing the individual who's acting as a spy, and to keep the secrets of this same Enigma Code.
Highly recommended, for this is a thrilling WWII tale with the Enigma Code at its centre and the results of treachery because of this Code, and that's why I like to call this book: "A Superb Enigma"!
This tale is set in the year 1943, and Tom Jericho and his team of cryptanalysts have broken the Enigma code of Hitler's U-boats.
All of a sudden a woman disappears, and that the question is, is she a traitor or is someone else a spy within this team.
When suspicion also falls on Tom Jericho himself, he knows that he has only option left, and that's the find the traitor by himself and unmask that person.
What is to follow is a very exciting and gripping historical WWII adventure about the Enigma code and what it can achieve, and in this environment of WWII, Tom Jericho must seem to survive the dangers when pursuing the individual who's acting as a spy, and to keep the secrets of this same Enigma Code.
Highly recommended, for this is a thrilling WWII tale with the Enigma Code at its centre and the results of treachery because of this Code, and that's why I like to call this book: "A Superb Enigma"!
September 17, 2018
Today everybody knows about Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire, where the British tried to keep up with the cryptography of the German Reich by cracking the enigma machine that coded the German communication. The name of Alan Turing is well known and his role in breaking the German coded messages are well documented in various other books and movies. So the book is not about about Turing but those who continued in his footsteps and their efforts to keep abreast of the German war effort and then especially the U-boat fleet in the northern Atlantic ocean and the battle for survival in the supply lines of the Allied forces.
Tom Jericho, a brilliant British mathematician , has a burnout and is send of to Cambridge to recuperate and to find his feet again in WWII that needs people like him. His rest does not last long when the Germans change all of their codes on one day. He gets recalled and finds himself in a storm of politics and becomes persona-non-grata in Bletchley Park. However his past catches up with him and turns into a fascination that only becomes stronger and also seems to hold the answer to why the Germans changed their codes. Is there a spy in the Park and how can they break the codes once more in order to save lives in the Atlantic.
An interesting and fascinating spy thriller situated in the world of Bletchley Park that feels often like you are part of it, as you live it. A very well documented world that comes to live due to the writing of Harris.
Well worth your time and effort in reading history that is brought in a great story.
Tom Jericho, a brilliant British mathematician , has a burnout and is send of to Cambridge to recuperate and to find his feet again in WWII that needs people like him. His rest does not last long when the Germans change all of their codes on one day. He gets recalled and finds himself in a storm of politics and becomes persona-non-grata in Bletchley Park. However his past catches up with him and turns into a fascination that only becomes stronger and also seems to hold the answer to why the Germans changed their codes. Is there a spy in the Park and how can they break the codes once more in order to save lives in the Atlantic.
An interesting and fascinating spy thriller situated in the world of Bletchley Park that feels often like you are part of it, as you live it. A very well documented world that comes to live due to the writing of Harris.
Well worth your time and effort in reading history that is brought in a great story.
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