The Star of Istanbul

This 2nd installment in the "Kit Cobb" series by Robert Owen Butler continues the adventures of former war correspondent, now American spy, Christopher Marlowe Cobb. To get some background on his new career, see my blog on The Hot Country. Cobb has now been trained to be a spy but continues to work under his journalism credentials. Thus it is that he is sent to trail a German spy, Walter Brauer, from New York to Europe on The Lusitania. We already know how that ends. But Cobb, Brauer, and a movie star with whom Cobb has had a shipboard fling are all rescued and so the game continues. Cobb eventually allies himself with actress Selene Bourgani, who, he discovers, had been working with Brauer but has now killed him.  Kit learns that her ultimate destination is Istanbul where she is to seduce the ruling pasha, a big fan of her movies, and find out what his plans are regarding an alliance with Germany. But Selene has a secret agenda; for, she is Armenian, not Greek as the Hollywood press have made out, and she plans to kill the pasha in retaliation for the multiple massacres of her people.
Butler provides wonderful historical detail and atmosphere as well as engaging plots. I have tired pretty quickly of Cobb's penchant for serially falling in love with dangerous women, although he never fails to complete his larger mission or report the stories.
Reviews here from Kirkus,  Publishers Weekly, and The Huntington News (includes a nice plot summary).