The Codebreaker's Secret: A WWII Novel

More romance than history and the narrator wasn’t my favorite, but great story and interesting perspective.

It was while drafting her second published novel, The Lieuteant's Nurse, that author Sara Ackerman, a native of Hawai'i, found inspiration for The Codebreaker's Secret. One character in that book was a linguist and through her research, Ackerman learned about the Dungeon, also known as Station Hypo, situated at Pearl Harbor, Hawai'i. There, as well as at other secure locations including Washington, D.C. and the Philippines, secret messages were decrypted which proved instrumental to the Allies' World War II victory. Work performed in the Dungeon -- so nicknamed because it was located underground -- contributed to success in the battle of Midway. Ackerman learned that it was primarily women -- more than ten thousand of them -- who cracked German and Japanese ciphers and codes, although none of them were assigned to the Dungeon so far as Ackerman was able to discern. She describes those women as America's "secret superpower, and they did everything from breaking major codes to translating messages to traffic analysis."

Ackerman conducted extensive research to learn about codebreaking -- an extremely technical, complicated, and often laborious and frustrating effort, as depicted in Ackerman's story, that often required years of work by teams. "Trying to understand the codes and how one would even go about breaking them was really mind-boggling," Ackerman admits. During the war, the codes and ciphers employed were sophisticated, which demonstrates how bright the women enlisted to break them had to be. Sadly, Ackerman was unable to locate any living codebreakers to interview about the process. But she discovered that it is a tedious process that involves a search for patterns and commonly used characters. Codes replace original messages with arbitrary symbols (numbers or letters). The code is usually memorialized in a codebook. "For example, code for Sara could be 7272, or as in the famous Japanese Wind codes during the war, East Wind Rain, broadcasted over the radio meant that war was imminent with the U.S." But ciphers alter original messages using algorithms (a series of instructions contained within a key). "For example, it could be to shift each letter by four. So A would be D, M would be O." In Hawai'i, codebreakers worked on a Japanese cipher machine called Purple (dubbed Magenta in The Codebreaker's Secret), as well as the Japanee naval code, JN-25, which figures in the story. Because they employed over thirty thousand five-numeral groups, along with additives (ciphers containing false arithmetic), the Japanese believed the code could not be cracked. But by doing just that, the U.S. defeated Japan. "Countless women had a hand in this," Ackerman relates. She describes the Allies' success as a collaboration of "brilliant minds," noting it is said that war in the Pacific Theater "was won in the Dungeon."

Isabel Cooper, Ackerman's protagonist in The Codebreaker's Secret, is her fictional compilation of the intelligent and dedicated women who, Ackerman laments, "were barely recognized for all of their contributions. That’s the thing about top secret work -- no one knows that you’re doing it, but often times, it’s the most important work of all." The story opens in September 1942. Isabel is a cryptanalyst stationed in Washington, D.C. and having trouble concentrating on her work on what would have been her brother's twenty-fifth birthday. Isabel wants nothing more desperately than to be transferred to Station Hypo at Pearl Harbor so that she can see the place where Walt's plane plunged into the Pacific Ocean on December 7, 1941. "Walt was out there somewhere, in the vast blue Pacific. He was part of the ocean now." She also wants to meet his buddies and hear the story from them. "I feel like I'll never be settled, never be able to move on, until I get over there and see for myself," she tells her friend and colleague, Nora. Walt loved Isabel more than anyone else and the two of them were extremely close. It was Walt who helped her navigate their mother's death, their father's subsequent "unraveling," and the lean years during which they struggled to survive and endured pounding dust storms on their Indiana farm before Isabel was fortunate enough to study math and physics at Goucher College. But her primary motivation for becoming a cryptanalyst was her desire for retribution for those responsible for the death of her big brother and dearest friend. She knows that her chances of being sent to Hawai'i are slim, but as the months wear on, Isabel's work results in much-needed progress toward deciphering critical codes. Surprisingly, her work is acknowledged and rewarded with the chance to work within the Combat Intelligence Unit at Station Hypo.

But Isabel was diagnosed with a phobia -- irrational fear or something real or perceived -- so after she arrives in Honolulu and meets her new roommate, Gloria, she has to talk herself into navigating the stairs down to the claustrophobic, smoke-filled Dungeon. "She debated turning around at least eleven more times, but in the end, the pull of the Dungeon was stronger than her fear," and the next chapter of her challenging career begins. She meets her male coworkers -- linguists (who translate decoded messages), combat intelligence specialists, traffic analysts (who crack extraneous portions of messages such as origination points and recipients), and her fellow "crippies." They are a decidedly eclectic group and the ensuing days are difficult. Each day she has to convince herself that she can traverse the stairs and walk through the steel door to her desk, endure hours in a room lacking natural light or ventilation and filled with her colleagues' cigarette smoke, and immerse herself in the JN-24 code and frequently changing additive books. During her scarce free time, she studies Japanese in order to enhance her effectiveness.

On her first Sunday off, Isabel and Glora set out in search of Second Lieutenant Matteo Russi, Walt's best friend and fellow pilot, who wrote to Isabel after Walt's death. Walt told Isabel all about the P-40 pursuit pilot who flew higher and faster than any of the other pilots, hated having his picture taken, and wore a dog tag bearing his dog's name during every flight. (Ackerma works at least one animal or reference to an animal into every one of her novels.) Russi is surprised to meet Isabel on O'ahu, but already knows a great deal about her because Walt talked to him about his sister all the time. The two decide that Russi will show Isabel all the beautiful places he went with Walt, who instantly fell in love with Hawai'i and planned to be a coffee farmer there after the war.

Russi is a handsome, charming, amateur photographer who only wants his camera focused on his subjects instead of himself who is resolved to not surviving the war. He has a reputation as a ladies' man, but Isabel has no consternation about spending time with him because she has never been in love and is not interested in romance. She wants only to succeed as a cryptanalyst to contribute to a U.S. victory, thereby avenging Walt's death, and hear all about Walt's experiences and death. But tragedy strikes when Gloria embarks on a date with her boyfriend, Dickie, from which she never returns. She is presumed drowned and her body is not recovered. Isabel, who has struggled in her new assignment and is threatened with transfer back to the mainland if she fails to produce results soon, is devastated. "Hadn't she already reached her quota of loss for a lifetime?" She is also highly suspicious about the circumstances leading up to and surrounding Gloria's death, but lacks solid evidence to provide the police. Her feelings for Russi become more complicated with each passing day and she is sure that he is attracted to her, as well. Russi is not sure what Isabel's role in the war effort is, but suspects that she is in possession of more information about the top-secret mission he has been called to undertake than she is permitted to share. Right before he leaves, he finally reveals the secret he has been keeping from Isabel, warning her to do herself a favor "and forget about me."

A parallel narrative opens in July 1965 on the Big Island of Hawai'i. Luana Freitas is coming home in her capacity as a journalist embarking on her first big assignment for Sunset magazine. She will cover the gala opening of the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel. Ackerman wanted to write about the opening of the hotel, an event her grandparents attended, for some time before she landed on the idea for a mystery set there. Laurance Rockefeller (1910 - 2004) was a visionary dedicated to wilderness preservation and protection, and so committed to ecology that he was named America's leading conservationist by Lady Bird Johnson. He built the hotel in an area that was considered a "wasteland," according to Ackerman, where no one believed it possible to situate a resort. The golf course was built first, and Rockefeller enlisted nine different architectural firms to complete the hotel's design. Hawai'ians were not happy about the hotel being erected, but Rockefeller also helped build the road, and hired a lot of women and, primarily, local residents to staff the first hotel built on the island and win over naysayers.

Lu arrives at the hotel hoping that her family will make the journey from Kona to visit with her there. Her father, who refused to help finance her college education, is too proud to admit that he was wrong to protest Lu's move to the mainland to launch her career. Lu grew up on a macadamia nut farm managed by her father, while his girlfriend, Donna, who moved in with them after the sudden death of Lu's mother, picked the nuts and cooked for the crew. But Lu struggled in school, and neither her father nor Donna was equipped to help her with her lessons. Her beloved Auntie H, a neighbor, intervened and tutored Lu. Now Lu is interacting with the dignitaries, politicians, and celebrities, including singer Joni Diaz, invited to the multi-day opening festivities. In the meantime, "fascinated by people and their motivations," she searches for an angle for the stories she will write for the magazine that is more provocative than a description of the resort's decor and scenery. She is quickly outgrowing her first job in journalism. "There were only so many backyard barbecues and wine tastings she could attend."

Lu is intimidated to learn that among the guests personally invited by Rockefeller is Matteo Russi. "Legend. Icon. He had been working for Life magazine almost as long as she's been alive. Maybe longer." He has recently left Life to do freelance work and their introduction is less than pleasant, which leaves Lu dismayed because she has wanted to meet him for as long as she can remember. He is still strikingly handsome, but gruff, prickly and stand-offish. Their paths continue crossing, however, and he begins calling her "kid" and giving her advice. Lu catches glimpses into Russi's past, which includes serving in the Army Air Corps during World War II and a mysteriously strong aversion to swimming in the ocean, but he divulges only vague snippets about himself. Even so, "it was plain to see that beneath the tough-guy facade lived a fear as wide a the ocean."

One morning, Joni fails to meet Lu for their morning swim and a desperate search for her is commenced. Russi and Lu join forces to investigate her disappearance and, hopefully, find her alive. With Lu's knowledge of the island and Russi's experience as a photojournalist, they make a formidable team and get to know each other better as they work to solve an increasingly disturbing mystery. As they unravel the truth about Joni's fate, startling discoveries move Russi closer to his admitted "unfinished business" and the regrets about his actions and choices with which he has been burdened for more than twenty years. Perhaps on the beautiful island of Hawai'i, he will find the answers he has sought and the peace for which he longs, as Lu establishes herself in the career for which she has prepared and reunites with her family, including the woman who made such a difference in her life, Auntie H.

Ackerman weaves the dual storylines, told via alternating chapters, into a cohesive, compelling story about survival, bravery, the lingering effects of war and grief, and second chances. Readers would never guess that Ackerman considers The Codebreaker's Secret the book she found most difficult to pen to date becaue of its dual timelines. She shares that she wrote the entire 1943 storyline first, then compiled the story set in 1965 and, finally, wove the two together, making revisions as needed in order to meld them. The two stories advance and merge seamlessly, and the mysteries she incorporates are both engrossing and cleverly imagined.

Ackerman's characters are fully developed and sympathetic. Isabel has sustained great losses in her life and is determined that the most painful, Walt's tragic death, will not be in vain. She is focused, extremely bright and capable, and resilient, as evidenced by the scene in which she has to force herself to enter the Dungeon in order to carry on her work as a cryptanalyst in the very location to which she wanted so badly to be transferred. She quickly develops a genuine affection for and deep friendship with Gloria, and feels herself pulled to Russi, at first because he is her only remaining connection to Walt. But as they get to know each other, she recognizes in him characteristics that she finds irresistible. He claims to have an inexplicable death pact with God, and it is not until he is about to undertake a dangerous and secretive mission that Isabel finally understands what motivates him: honor, grief, and misplaced guilt. Lu is, as Isabel was two decades earlier, young, determined, and ambitious. She wanted to create a life for herself beyond the confines of Hawai'i, even though she loves her home and its people. The Russi she encounters has changed over the years because of his varied experiences in the military and as a photojournalist, but some aspects of his personality have not changed at all. He still has an inate integrity and curiosity, which has served him well in his profession, but Lu recognizes that he is haunted by personal demons. Because of her immense respect and growing affection for him she wants very much to help him. What she does not realize at the beginning of the story is that by helping Russi and working with him to resolve the mystery surrounding Joni's disappearance, she will also discover her own path to a fulfilling future because "sometimes we have to leave a place before we understand how much it means to us."

In The Codebreaker's Secret, as with her other novels, Ackerman pays homage to her beautiful home, following the old adage that writers should write what they know. She employs her knowledge of the islands' history and geography to craft evocative prose, transporting readers to both O'ahu and Hawai'i. Russi takes Isabel up steep, narrow roads to O'ahu's Pali lookout, and they visit Goat Island. Ackerman is familiar with the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel and the area surrounding it, and her descriptions of the resort and its beaches are luscious and affectionately crafted. Readers who have never visited the Hawai'ian islands will understand why Ackerman's characters fall in love with the fiftieth state and, like Walt, want to remain there.

Hawai'i is more than beautiful. It also has a rich history related to World War II, and not solely because it was the site of the attack that pulled the U.S. into World War II. Ackerman says she enjoys shining a light on little-known stories about the islands and their people, and seeks to write uplifting tales about love. Her stories often incorporate heartbreak, and The Codebreaker's Secret is no exception, but her goal is to "bring inspiring stories to life."

As to the smart, courageous, and devoted women codebreakers who played a vital role in the Allies' victory, Ackerman says, "I hope I have done them justice." She decidedly has. With her latest dazzling work of historical fiction, she has immortalized those women by bringing their never-before-told story to a new, deeply grateful audience.

Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader's Copy of the book.

Very entertaining; loved it; historical fiction: a favorite genre