Date: Fri, 28 Oct 2005 12:18:29 -0400 (EDT)
From: dicconf <dicconf at radix.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Odd combination...
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

On Thu, 27 Oct 2005, Michael Walsh wrote:

> Catching up with some back issues of the Times Literary Supplement (aka
> TLS) and there was a letter in the  23 September issue regarding women
> writers using initials, (like C. L. Moore).  Letter writer mentions "The
> Undying Monster" by Jessie Douglas Kerruish.  Calls it a "classic novel
> of cryptanalysis and lycanthropy."
>
> Cryptanalysis and lycanthropy?
>
> Able to break codes only at the full moon?

If it's the same one I'm thinking of, it's not really cryptanalysis.  The
clue to the monster's identity is in a line of Archaic (Medievel?) French
that the protagonists have to puzzle out, but it's not encrypted -- just
obscure.  I guess "a classic novel of etymological research and
lycanthropy" doesn't have the same ring.

-- Dick Eney