Robert Olen Butler

Author Information
Robert Olen Butler's Latest Book

Newest Release

  • Bibliography:
    27 Books (1 Series)
  • First Book:
    February 1985
  • Latest Book:
    September 2021
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Full Series List in Order

A Christopher Marlowe Cobb Thriller

1 - The Hot Country (Oct-2012)
2 - The Star of Istanbul (Oct-2013)
3 - The Empire of Night (Oct-2014)
4 - Paris in the Dark (Sep-2018)

Multi-Author Series List

Bibliomysteries

34 - The Hemingway Valise (Dec-2018)

Book List in Order: 27 titles

  • On Distant Ground

    The winner of the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. An army intelligence captain is to be court-martialled for having kidnapped and set free a Viet Cong officer. This forces him to confront two sets of events - his own concern for the prisoner, and hi...

  • Sun Dogs

    Ten miles apart in a New Mexico desert, unknown to each other, two scientists are involved in secret work. One is engaged in unearthing the past, the other in shattering the present. Through the contrasting mysteries of their projects and the woman t...

  • Wabash

  • The Deuce

  • Good Scent from a Strange Mountain

    Winner of the Pulitzer Prize: “Uncannily perceptive stories written by an American from the viewpoint of Vietnamese citizens transplanted to Louisiana” (People).  A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain is Robert Olen Butler’s Pulitzer Prize...

  • The Alleys of Eden

  • They Whisper

  • Countrymen of Bones

    The harsh Arizona desert, at the time of the first atomic bomb test during the 1940s, becomes the backdrop for a love triangle between physicist Lloyd Coulter, archaeologist Darrell Reeves, and Anna, the woman they both love...

  • Tabloid Dreams

    There are a dozen ways the American Dream can go awry in this “unrepeatable . . . tour de force” of short fiction from the Pulitzer Prize"winning author (The Washington Post Book World).   “[With] touches of Italo Calvino,...



  • The Deep Green Sea

    “A wrenching love story” about the relationship between a Vietnam veteran and a woman who was orphaned when Saigon fell, by a Pulitzer Prize-winning author (Chicago Tribune).This is an incandescent tale of modern love between a Vietnamese woman, ...

  • Mr. Spaceman

    “A surprisingly sweet and droll first-person account of the vexed attempts of an alien to understand the bafflingly unpredictable human race.” -- Kirkus Reviews   The Pulitzer Prize"winning author “raises fin de siècle literature to ne...

  • Fair Warning

    The Pulitzer Prize"winning author’s “strange and finally beautiful tale about obsession and modern love” (Beth Kephart, The Baltimore Sun).  Fair Warning is acclaimed novelist Robert Olen Butler’s enthralling glimpse into a Manhattan a...

  • Had a Good Time

    ”Gloriously imaginative and utterly hypnotizing short stories” inspired by vintage twentieth-century postcards, from a Pulitzer Prize-winning author (Booklist, starred review).For many years, author Robert Olen Butler has collected picture postca...

  • Severance

    Now available in an elegant paperback, Robert Olen Butler's acclaimed collection, Severance, depicts the final thoughts of people as they are losing their heads. Celebrated as "glorious" (Los Angeles Times), these fascinating stories reveal "the limi...

  • Intercourse

  • Hell

    “A novel that explores the darker side of human nature while making you laugh so hard iced tea almost comes out your nose.” -- The Tampa Tribune   One of American literature’s brightest stars and author of the Pulitzer Prize"winning A G...

  • The 2009 Robert Olen Butler Prize Stories

    The Robert Olen Butler Prize Stories represents the best in contemporary short fiction. These eleven stories, including Annie Weatherwax's prize-winning story, "The Possibility of Things," selected by Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler, demonst...

  • A Small Hotel

    Set in contemporary New Orleans but working its way back in time, A Small Hotel chronicles the relationship between Michael and Kelly Hays, who have decided to separate after twenty-four years of marriage. The book begins on the day that the Hays are...

  • The Hot Country

    A Christopher Marlowe Cobb Thriller - 1

    In The Hot Country, Christopher Marlowe Cobb ("Kit"), the swashbuckling early 20th century American newspaper war correspondent travels to Mexico in April and May of 1914, during that country’s civil war, the American invasion of Vera Cruz and the ...



  • The Star of Istanbul

    A Christopher Marlowe Cobb Thriller - 2

    World War I is in full swing. Germany has allied itself with the Ottoman empire, persuading the caliphs of Turkey to declare a jihad on the British empire, as President Woodrow Wilson hesitates to enter the fray. War correspondent and American spy Ch...

  • The Empire of Night

    A Christopher Marlowe Cobb Thriller - 3

    In the first two books of his acclaimed Christopher Marlowe Cobb series, The Hot Country and The Star of Istanbul, Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler captured the hearts of historical crime fiction fans with the artfulness of his World War I se...

  • Perfume River

    From one of America’s most important writers, PERFUME RIVER is an exquisite novel that examines family ties and the legacy of the Vietnam War through the portrait of a single North Florida family. Robert Quinlan is a seventy-year-old historian, ...

  • Severance // Intercourse

  • Paris in the Dark

    A Christopher Marlowe Cobb Thriller - 4

    A novel of murder and espionage during the First World War: “Rich atmosphere and a propulsive plot...a satisfying, stylish thrill.”―The Tampa Bay Times Autumn 1915. World War I is raging across Europe, but Woodrow Wilson has kept Americans out ...

  • The Hemingway Valise

    Bibliomysteries - 34

    An American spy in Paris solves a legendary mystery as the Pulitzer Prize"winning author’s “thrilling historical series” continues (The Wall Street Journal).   Former Chicago journalist turned globe-trotting spy Christopher Marlowe Cobb...

  • The Best Peace Fiction

    In the first anthology of its kind, Robert Olen Butler and Phong Nguyen assemble an astounding collection of stories that cause readers to contemplate war, peace, and social justice in a new light. The fourteen stories featured in this volume explore...

  • Late City

    The Pulitzer Prize"winning author shares an “exceptionally nuanced, tender, funny, tragic, and utterly transfixing portrait” of one man’s troubled century (Booklist, starred review).At 115 years old, former newspaperman Sam Cunningham is also...

Award-Winning Books by Robert Olen Butler

Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
1993 Pulitzer Prize -- Fiction


Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Robert Olen Butler has published 27 books.

Robert Olen Butler does not have a new book coming out soon. The latest book, Late City, was published in September 2021.

The first book by Robert Olen Butler, On Distant Ground, was published in February 1985.

Yes. Robert Olen Butler has 1 series.
Author Series
Multi-Author Series
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