"Mai plays adroitly with literary genre and crafts a story of Borgesian subtlety and complexity." "The New Yorker"
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Rong Jinzhen, an autistic math genius with a past shrouded in myth, is forced to abandon his academic pursuits when he is recruited into Unit 701: a top-secret Chinese intelligence agency whose sole purpose is counterespionage and code-breaking. As China's greatest cryptographer, Rong discovers that the mastermind behind the maddeningly difficult Purple Code is his former teacher and best friend, who is now working for China's enemy but this is only the first of many betrayals.
The first novel to be published in English by one of China's greatest contemporary writers, "Decoded" is a riveting tale of obsession and a profound exploration of the mind of an inspired genius, one that discovers in cryptography the key to the human heart."