The Cipher

by Nick Slosser

A society lady has been poisoned to death at her own party, and a search of the body has turned up a mysterious enciphered message. The press speculates about spies and atomic secrets, and the police need the code broken before a Red Scare sets in. So they go to Professor Leland Truffault. Haunted by his wartime experiences as a cryptographer at Bletchley Park, he now hides in academia at Laurelhurst University. But the secret message draws him out...as does the hunt for a sly and ruthless killer. Racing against time as police close in on the wrong suspect--one he dearly wants to keep safe--Truffault risks it all to take part in a deadly game. But the professor knows a thing or two about how a game is played, and he won't quit before the last move.

422 pages, Paperback

First published February 27, 2015

Reviews

[Dana Berglund · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a throwback to noir detective novels, set in 1950s Portland, but with a modern sensibility coloring some of the "issues" that come up. The main character is an academic who works in linguistics and mathematics, particularly logic and puzzles. He was a code breaker in WWII who now prefers to stay in his academic world than to get involved. He is asked to help with a police investigation that involves a tricky cipher, and we are off! I could see this becoming a series in which we follow our code breakers each time they are dragged into a case.
The research into mid-century Portland was obviously extensive, but maybe sometimes the reader didn't need quite so many details proving it.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read! Agatha Christie meets The Da Vinci Code. Strong sense of setting and time in a post-war Portland, OR.