The Star of Istanbul, Robert Olen Butler
The Star of Istanbul, Robert Olen Butler
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The Star of Istanbul
A Christopher Marlowe Cobb Thriller

Author: Robert Olen Butler

Narrator: Ray Chase

Unabridged: 12 hr 45 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/07/2013


Synopsis

The first World War is underway; Germany has allied with the Ottoman Empire, and the Turkish caliphs have declared jihad on the British Empire. Meanwhile, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson hesitates to enter the fray. Aboard the passenger liner Lusitania, war correspondent and American spy Kit Cobb has been assigned to shadow a German intellectual and possible covert agent who is believed to have information vital to the war effort. During the voyage Cobb is smitten with famed actress Selene Bourgani, who inexplicably seems to be working for the Germans.

Cobb soon realizes this simple actress is anything but, as she harbors secrets that could pour gasoline on a world already in flames. From the doomed voyage of the Lusitania to the darkest corners of London to the powder keg that is Istanbul, Cobb must venture deep behind enemy lines and use all the cunning in his possession to uncover Bourgani’s true motives.

About Robert Olen Butler

Robert Olen Butler is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of nineteen novels, including Hell, A Small Hotel, Perfume River, and the Christopher Marlowe Cobb series. He is also the author of six short story collections and a book on the creative process, From Where You Dream. He has twice won a National Magazine Award in Fiction and received the 2013 F. Scott Fitzgerald Award for Outstanding Achievement in American Literature. He teaches creative writing at Florida State University.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Elizabeth (Alaska) on September 22, 2022

I'm so glad I stumbled onto this series. I read the first in the series because I had been alerted that there was something about Mexico, Germany and the US early in WWI, and I wanted to get a taste of what that was about without having to get bogged down in some academic nonfiction. Neither The Hot......more

Goodreads review by David on November 25, 2013

A while back, I decided (again) that life is just too damn short to read easy, pop books, and that I would dedicate my reading and living only to challenge. Then, after reading Pynchon's Bleeding Edge (Challenging and I loved it), I gave my brain a rest and read Olen's The Star of Istanbul. One of t......more

Goodreads review by David on October 12, 2013

BOOK REVIEW: 'The Star of Istanbul': Continuing the Saga of Kit Cobb: Foreign Correspondent, Secret Agent Man A year has passed in the eventful life of Christopher Marlowe "Kit" Cobb, foreign correspondent and spy and a marvelous creation of author Robert Olen Butler. We last saw Kit Cobb in Mexico......more

Goodreads review by Christopher on January 25, 2019

I liked this book a lot. A great adventure and a great love story. Kit Cobb is more of a spy this time than a newspaperman, working for the US at the beginning of WWI sent on a mission to Istanbul and sailing on the Lusitania, another one of the great unsinkable ocean liners. Uh oh. The character of......more

Goodreads review by Victoria on March 10, 2014

I received The Star of Istanbul as a free giveaway on Goodreads. An excellent book of political intrigue and spies during WWI, filled with long-forgotten history, it was a hard book to put down. A captivating story line, with riveting characters, and enough twists and turns to captivate the reader.......more