Christopher Marlowe Cobb Books In Order

Publication Order of Christopher Marlowe Cobb Books

The Christopher Marlowe Cobb book series is a wonderful series of historical fiction, thriller, adventure, mystery, espionage, and world war novels. It is written by a reputed American author named Robert Olen Butler. This series contains a total of 4 novels published between 2012 and 2018. Each of the books of this series features the lead protagonist in the role of Christopher Marlowe Cobb. Robert Olen Butler has given the description of Christopher Cobb as that of a war correspondent and a spy working for the American government at the time of the First World War. Christopher is commonly referred to as ‘Kit’ by the ones who know him well.

The settings of each of the novels of the series are done at the time of the World War I. In addition to Christopher ‘Kit’ Marlowe Cobb, the other essential characters depicted by Olen Butler include Victoriano Huerta, Luisa, Woodrow Wilson, Brauer, Selene Bourgani, Isabel Cobb, Joseph William Hunter, Albert Stockholm, James Polk Trask, and a few others as well. The plots’ settings take place between 1914 and 1917, and are set in multiple places like Mexico, Chicago, Berlin, Germany, Turkey, London, England, etc. All the four books were highly appreciated by the critics and readers alike. Robert O. Butler’s character development, storyline, plot description, and writing skills in this series were praised by many of his fellow authors. The excellent reviews and comments from the prominent critics helped the books as well as the series as a whole to become immensely successful.

Robert Olen Butler is an award winning author from The United States. He is popular for writing mystery, thriller, historical fiction, suspense novels and short stories. Altogether, he has written and published 16 novels in his career. Butler has won the Pulitzer Prize in 1993 for his book called A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain. In 2013, Butler was given the Outstanding Achievement Fitzgerald Award. Besides this, he has won various other awards and accolades over the course of his writing career. Butler’s stories have featured widely in a number of publications like Esquire, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, Zoetrope, Harper’s, GQ, Granta, Virginia Quarterly, Sewanee Review, Paris Review, Ploughshares, etc. They have also been selected for inclusion in 4 annual editions of The Best Short Stories of America, 8 editions of New Stories, several other annual anthologies, and many textbooks of college literature. Robert Butler’s works have been widely translated into as many as 21 languages, including Thai, Japanese, Estonian, Vietnamese, Serbian, Chinese, Polish, Greek, Korean, Farsi, etc. The American Vietnam Veterans awarded Butler with the Tu Do Chinh-Kien Award for his outstanding contribution.

In the last couple of decades, he has given lectures at numerous universities and appeared at multiple conferences. Butler has also worked with writers’ groups in over 17 countries, teaching the upcoming writers about the different elements of creative writing. Butler holds the Michale Shara Chair at the Florida State University as a Distinguished Professor. Once, Butler filmed his writing process in real time while writing a short story and broadcast it for the aspiring writers to gain inspiration. This has never been attempted by any other writer. Other than writing novels & short stories, Butler has worked for several production companies for writing screenplays. Some of the biggest companies that he has worked for include Warner Brothers, Disney, Baldwin, New Regency, Universal Pictures, etc. As of today, Robert Butler resides in Florida along with his lovely wife Kelly Lee Butler, who is a renowned poet.

The debut book of the Christopher Marlowe Cobb series written by author Robert Olen Butler is entitled ‘The Hot Country’. It was released in 2012 by the Mysterious Press publication. The setting of this novel is done in Mexico and it features the primary characters as Victoriano Huerta, Luisa, Christopher ‘Kit’ M. Cobb, etc. At the story’s beginning, it is stated that Christopher Cobb visits Mexico in April & May 1914 as a war correspondent. The situation is highly volatile due to the ongoing civil war, Victoriano Huerta’s controversial presidency, and America’s Vera Cruz invasion.

While covering the ongoing war in the enemy territory and scorching heat, Kit develops soft feelings for a young actress from Mexico named Luisa. It turns out that Luisa is not what she appears to be. After some time, Kit witnesses the alleged shooting of a priest, but the bullet hits the cross around the priest’s neck and doesn’t cause any harm to him. Following this incident, Kit hires the help of a pickpocket to find out the sniper’s identity. He also tries to find out the intention behind the arrival of high-ranked German officials in the city during the night. What bothers him more is that all the officials have come in ammunition ships. Kit realizes that something big is about to happen that might change the course of the war. He strives to get to the bottom of the intrigue and prevent anything sinister from happening.

The next volume of this historical fiction series is called ‘The Star of Istanbul’. It was also published by Mysterious Press in 2013. In this novel, Butler has described the important characters as Selene Bourgani, Christopher Cobb, Brauer, and Woodrow Wilson. The story is primarily set in Turkey and London. At the book’s start, it is seen that World War One is going on in its full swing. Germany becomes the ally of the Ottoman Empire and declares war on Turkey’s caliphs with the intention of causing damage to the British Empire later on. Christopher Cobb is asked to keep an eye on a German intellectual named Brauer and follow his activities. It is believed that Brauer is an agent of the secret service and holds important information related to the ongoing war. So, Christopher boards the ship Lusitania, which is already boarded by Brauer.

As the ship moves through the perilous waters on the fateful voyage, Christopher Cobb gets blown away by the beautiful actress Selene Bourgani. He discovers it later that Selene is working for the German Intelligence. Christopher senses that Selene is not as simple and innocent as she looks. He suspects that she is holding crucial secrets about the raging war. Following the attack on Lusitania by a German U-Boat, Christopher follows Brauer and Selene Bourgani into London’s darkest alleyways. The trail takes him to Istanbul, where he realizes that he must use all his intelligence to uncover the true motives of Selene. It comes as a great shock to Christopher when he learns that Selene’s hidden agenda could bring down the most powerful leaders of the world.