From the New York Times reporters who first uncovered S.S. officer Aribert Heim’s secret life in Egypt comes the never-before-told story of the most hunted Nazi war criminal in the world.Dr. Aribert Heim worked at the Mauthausen concentration camp for only a few months in 1941 but left a devastating mark. According to the testimony of survivors; Heim euthanized patients with injections of gasoline into their hearts. He performed surgeries on otherwise healthy people. Some recalled prisoners' skulls set out on his desk to display perfect sets of teeth. Yet in the chaos of the postwar period; Heim was able to slip away from his dark past and establish himself as a reputable doctor and family man in the resort town of Baden-Baden. His story might have ended there; but for certain rare Germans who were unwilling to let Nazi war criminals go unpunished; among them a police investigator named Alfred Aedtner. After Heim fled on a tip that he was about to be arrested; Aedtner turned finding him into an overriding obsession. His quest took him across Europe and across decades; and into a close alliance with legendary Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal. The hunt for Heim became a powerful symbol of Germany's evolving attitude toward the sins of its past; which finally crested in a desire to see justice done at almost any cost. As late as 2009; the mystery of Heim’s disappearance remained unsolved. Now; in The Eternal Nazi; Nicholas Kulish and Souad Mekhennet reveal for the first time how Aribert Heim evaded capture--living in a working-class neighborhood of Cairo; praying in Arabic; beloved by an adopted Muslim family--while inspiring a manhunt that outlived him by many years. It is a brilliant feat of historical detection that illuminates a nation’s dramatic reckoning with the crimes of the Holocaust.
#10741 in Books Simon Singh 2000-08-29 2000-08-29Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 8.00 x .87 x 5.18l; .73 #File Name: 0385495323432 pagesThe Code Book The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography
Review
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful. Shhhhhh!By Daniel MyersLike all narrative non-fictional works that; eventually in this case; deal with technical subjects whose details are beyond the scope of the non-specialist reader; this book attempts to strike a balance between two extremes; between a book so chock-full of technical detail that it reads like a textbook and a book that skimps so completely on the heart of the matter at hand that it can only be described as fluff. Singh has done a remarkable job in balancing the two here; it seems to me; and the book is worth any reader's time whose interest is piqued by cryptography.Singh is singularly aided by his subject matter here. This book was recommended to me by a fellow poster on a crossword puzzle blog which I frequent; as a daily solver of the New York Times crossword. The discussions on the blog vary from the whimsical to the technical with all manner of things mooted. So goes Singh's book as well. But what makes this possible is that cryptography and cryptanalysis; for most of human history; has been no more complex; au fond; than a very difficult crossword puzzle. And one is not surprised to see a crossword used during WWII by the British to test potential candidates for work at top secret Bletchley Park; which was responsible for cracking Germany's "Enigma" code. The crossword is provided in the book and was jolly fun to solve.It seems to me that up to the Vigenère polyalphabetic coding; known for centuries as "le chiffre indéchifferable"; anyone with an interest in this book could understand and create such a cipher and write an encrypted message in it. Indeed; it's in deciphering such messages without the "keyword" that the technical going gets somewhat involved and perhaps beyond the ken of some readers not familiar with basic statistical analysis; and; not coincidentally; this decipherment of such encryptions is where maths starts to predominate. But it's certainly not difficult to understand the concept of how these encryptions are deciphered; it's merely very tedious and painstaking to do it as Charles Babbage finally did in the 19th Century.Up to this point; for this reader in any event; no trade-off was necessary and Singh is free to fill his tale of codes and ciphers with histories which hinge upon them; starting with the life and death of Mary; Queen of Scots. Also; he makes an elegant segue in the tale of how the Linear B tablets were finally translated; and the toing and froing of certain egotistical archaeologists etc. - It should be noted here the final decipherment and translation of Linear B was the cumulative work of men (and one woman) of genius who were linguistic prodigies. - Again; pass the 19th century and the non-specialist becomes more than a tad lost in the; literally and figuratively; nuts and bolts of Enigma machines and multi-lingual scholarship and fluency.Thus; it's no surprise that the ending of the book was the weakest part for me. Though it must be said that Singh goes out of his way to use "Alice; Bob; Eve" analogies to make the concepts clearer most effectively; being able to do what the main players in the tale are doing is far beyond the amateur's grasp. Also; the book is thirteen years old and the final sections dealing with computer encryption seem a bit dated already.In sum though; a very pleasing; well-written book about the perennial human need to keep matters secret.2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. A little outdated for modern topicsBy Joe BedaI really enjoyed the historical perspective of encryption and codes. Simon Singh does a great job of showing how both cryptography techniques were created and broken through history. As someone involved in the computer industry; however; the more "modern" sections are showing their age. This is a fast moving area. It would be great to see the book updated with more context of state actors and the revelations that have surfaced over the last ~10 years.1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. I read the condensed version a decade ago and loved it; so decided to get the full book ...By Joseph H.I read the condensed version a decade ago and loved it; so decided to get the full book now. To be honest; I think the condensed version is better and more appealing to non-geeks; but I have enough geek in me to not be bored by the TL;DR version.What's great is that encryption still hasn't moved on much since the book was written so it is still very relevant. The discussion about quantum computers and quantum encryption is great introduction to stuff that is becoming a reality today.
