Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

The Cobra

3.43 of 5 stars 3.43 · rating details · 2,053 ratings · 258 reviews

An extraordinary cutting-edge thriller from the New York Times-bestselling grandmaster of international suspense.

Meticulous research, crisp narratives, plots as current as today's headlines-Frederick Forsyth has helped define the international thriller as we know it. And now he does it again.

What if you had carte blanche to fight evil? Nothing held back, nothing off the...more

Hardcover, 384 pages

Published August 17th 2010 by G. P. Putnam’s Sons (first published January 1st 2010)

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John le Carré

The Spy Who Came In from the Cold by John le Carré

Best Spy Novels

216th out of 488 books — 449 voters

The Blank

199th out of 227 books — 22 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 3,000)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Nov 21, 2011 Avadhut rated it 3 of 5 stars

http://avadhutrecommends.wordpress.co...

Summary –

The master story teller returns with Cal Dexter and his nemesis Paul Devereux from “The Avenger” who team up together this time to fight the mighty cocaine cartel of Columbia.

Review –

Among the action thrillers I have always been fond of continental authors especially the British than their American counterparts. I prefer the novels that are little slow in pace, lesser violence and the ones that set up an elaborate plot. Frederick Forsyth is a fron...more

like · see review

Mar 02, 2013 Eric Wright rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, own, thriller-suspense, mystery

Shocked by the death of a young man through a drug overdose, the president of the US determines to do something to eradicate the scourge of cocaine. He calls together a high-powered group and asks what can be done. A radical and relentless operative, Paul Devereaux, former leader of Special Ops of the CIA is called in and tasked with the destruction of the cartels. This man, the Cobra, demands time and resources and ultimate authority to do whatever it takes. He is given these powers, reluctantl...more

1 like · like · see review

Nov 29, 2012 Vijai rated it 3 of 5 stars

Even the masters make mistakes or so I am to believe by this lack luster performance by Mr.Forsyth.

I am not saying it is bad, it just does not register even a blip on the Forsyth scale - an instrument of fiction writing awesomeness that all other action thriller writers will be measured by - this is the man who wrote Devil's alternative and the Fist of God for crying out loud.

I am a noob here and doling out details of the plot seems to be considered a cardinal sin here so I will keep it releva...more

like · see review

Aug 09, 2012 Mike rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed

A young teenager dies in a Washington DC slum. That night the US President sits down to a dinner with guests in the white house. A waitress breaks down and begins crying. Escorted from the room, the First Lady follows and learns that the waitress is the grandmother of the young teenager who died directly from the use of cocaine. Tossing and turning in the night, the president decides to do something about the issue. To destroy the cocaine industry.

Seemingly staffed with retirees, Operation Cobr...more A young teenager dies in a Washington DC slum. That night the US President sits down to a dinner with guests in the white house. A waitress breaks down and begins crying. Escorted from the room, the First Lady follows and learns that the waitress is the grandmother of the young teenager who died directly from the use of cocaine. Tossing and turning in the night, the president decides to do something about the issue. To destroy the cocaine industry.

Seemingly staffed with retirees, Operation Cobra is launched. Headed by an ex-CIA operative, Paul Devereaux, who had been let go because he was too . . . tough. Cobra is a codename he had used. The name of the operation, and later in the book, the name of the author of a blog. He, Cobra, puts into the second in command position the one man who outsmarted him. Cal Dexter. Also the man who Cobra tried to kill when he ran across him in the past, but we won't get into that.

So, the operation is put into place. Drug shipments from the Columbian cartel that controls access to cocaine are interfered with. Tempers flare. People die. Most of the time people think of fantasy as something that involves magic, sword and sorcery, dragons, orcs, and the like. There is something of a fantastical element, though, in creating a little fantasy where a seemingly impossible to fight problem is examined closely, and thoroughly destroyed. The fantasy of the smart man called forth to solve the big problem, handled with a certain ease. This book seemed to be going that route, but then reality stepped in. I do not want to give too much away now, so I will move on.

The story was strong, interesting. The characters seemed real, for the most part. There were certain segments, though, where a desire to skip forward had to be fought against. The book I read was an uncorrected advance review book, and there were misspellings and the like that had to be ignored. All in all an interesting good quick read. I would recommend the book.
(less)

like · see review

Jun 20, 2012 Jerome rated it 2 of 5 stars

Given Forsyth's standards, Cobra falls short and is disappointing.

The first half of the book is good, as the US and British prepare for their covert war against a powerful Colombian cocaine cartel. It's toward the second half of the book where things go downhill. Navy SEALs and British SBS marines intercept drug shipments on the high seas. A contracted Brazilian fighter pilot shoots down aircraft carrying cocaine. This happens several times, over and over again, and each scene is just a repeat o...more

1 like · like · see review

Aug 19, 2011 Tony Johnston rated it 1 of 5 stars

Awful. I only read it because I had nothing else and I was duly disappointed.

My guess is that Mr Forsyth has had a few drinks one night and told his agreeable old chums "Bloody governments, no backbone! If they wanted to close the drug trade, they could do it! I could do it! Give me some guns and a budget of a couple of billion! I'd kill the lot of 'em!"

And so he's written up his idea into a page-turning thriller to show how he would do it. In summary, a rogue "Cobra" leading an unfettered SBS/S...more

3 likes · like · see review

Jul 12, 2011 J. Luis rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Comentaba más arriba que tenía reciente El poder del perro y lo cierto es que aunque el tema de ambos libros está relacionado con el mundo de la droga ambos libros tienen poco que ver. Mucho más duro el de Winslow, Cobra va más al meollo de la cuestión, es más directo y como es habitual en su autor está profusamente documentado. La historia es de las que enganchan, aunque no me ha gustado demasiado la separación que hace por capítulos pues me ha resultado un tanto anárquica. En cualquier caso me...more

like · see review

Dec 07, 2010 Tim Niland rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010-reads

Not lacking in ambition is Forsyth's thriller which takes the "war on drugs" to the farthest possible conclusion. The president becomes so angry with the influx of cocaine into the US and Europe that he looks for the only man who can stop it. A retired CIA agent code named Cobra is given carte blanche in terms of the military and intelligence apparatus of the United States and is ordered to crush the cocaine cartels. So basically the deal is that cocaine production and smuggling is declared a te...more

1 like · like · see review

Aug 27, 2010 Joseph Grinton rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: recent-reads

A lot of people reviewing this book seem to have been reading free copies. I bought mine as an audio book. I needed something to replace another audio book, a spy story set in Afghanistan -- not Frederick Forsyth's The Afghan, but something by another writer altogether -- which was turning into a very tedious 22 hours.

The Cobra is only 11 hours and it is very concise. There is a lot of information packed in here. Freddie calls upon all his training as a journalist. We only get the essential fac...more A lot of people reviewing this book seem to have been reading free copies. I bought mine as an audio book. I needed something to replace another audio book, a spy story set in Afghanistan -- not Frederick Forsyth's The Afghan, but something by another writer altogether -- which was turning into a very tedious 22 hours.

The Cobra is only 11 hours and it is very concise. There is a lot of information packed in here. Freddie calls upon all his training as a journalist. We only get the essential facts. Well, mostly. He puffs them up a bit. If I'd been his editor I would have blue-pencilled all those bits where he's telling us how much money you can make from cocaine, which he seems to do every time he is describing a delivery, which he does a lot.

But then I suppose Freddie couldn't help thinking about the money when he was writing this book, which he says he wrote in three months. I wonder how much coffee he needed to sustain him when he was writing it. Or something stronger. Surely not ... no, not our Freddie. He is too much a part of the establishment.

The first four or five hours of this book are background reportage. Freddie is setting the scene. He is painstakingly showing us how the cocaine industry fits together so that he doesn't have to explain anything when it all comes crashing down in the second half of the book.

I almost called it a novel there but it's not really a novel. It's more like a dramatised hypothesis. Freddie hasn't got time to stop and sketch any characters, let alone develop them. I'm not sure he could develop them if he did take the time. I think he's more interested in guns and helicopters than in people. But there is an intimation of a novelist in here. It peeps through in places, an unfulfilled ambition, a possibility of an alternative career -- what might have been.

The second half of the plot rips along at a cracking pace. You are really glad he explained everything to you earlier. Now you can just enjoy the thrill of seeing it all fall apart.

The ending is exciting, which is no small achievement. Still, I think he could do better.

Everyone knows Freddie does a lot of research. Partly because he tells us this in all his interviews. But also because you can see all the details there in his books. They are essential reading for other thriller writers who want to get their facts right. There are even a lot of compressed scenes in The Cobra that could be ripped out and expanded into fully-fledged stories by some of those other writers.

This is a strength but it is also a weakness. There is a piece he wrote about his trip to Guinea-Bissau that has a lot more detail then you'll find in the book, and it's a lot more interesting than the book. What I'd like to see is Freddie really try hard at writing a novel. Something that he doesn't dash off in three months. Come on, Freddie. I know you've got it in you. Something Sandy would want to read and recommend to her friends on her lunch dates!(less)

like · see review

Oct 11, 2012 Jill Holmes rated it 4 of 5 stars

Although this isn't my favorite book by the incredibly prolific Frederick Forsyth, I still recommend it because he tackles a subject few would dare. "The Cobra" is the code name of both a man and a project. A former CIA Special Ops master, Paul Devereaux is hauled out of retirement to eradicate the cocaine trade. Given carte blanche by the President and heavily assisted by the British and a Brazilian fighter pilot on a personal revenge crusade, the Cobra hires a former bounty hunter named Cal De...more

1 like · like · see review

May 14, 2013 Nate rated it 2 of 5 stars

It's been a few years since I picked up a Forsyth book, and I was hoping I would enjoy this one as much as the last one. It was full of the same level of detail and intricate plans that I've come to expect, but this one didn't really stand up. It became repetitive in the middle, and the ending was bizarre to say the least. There were several big plot holes and some of the budgetary math he used just didn't hold up. If $2 billion could almost kill the cartel after a year and a half of setup, why...more

like · see review

Mar 25, 2012 Herlock rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: action

For about 70% of the book, all I knew about the story was that the Columbian cartel was being run as a corporation, pure cocaine is "cut" 6 to 7 times before being used, the profits are astronomical (ASTRONOMICAL!), there are 2-3 routes cocaine takes into US and continental Europe, and the people involved are very violent. The reason why I knew that? Because that information was repeated every 10 pages or so.

All in all, the story feels repetitive. And the bigger problem is that the story of a we...more

like · see review

Jan 25, 2013 Jim Puskas rated it 3 of 5 stars

The grittiest of Forsythe's books so far, even more violent in places than Avenger. As it happens, it features the return of Cal Dexter, prime character of Avenger. But dealing as it does with the Cocaine trade and the vicious gangs that run that filthy business, a high degree of violence was unavoidable. The main weakness of this book is its failure to present any truly compelling, sympathetic characters that the reader is likely to care about. Forsythe is a great story teller but (with a few e...more

like · see review

Sep 25, 2011 Jonathan Shaw rated it 5 of 5 stars

the ballet of all master story telling.

After an overdoes becomes major news, the USA president poses a question: Could the Narcotisct industry be destroyed? Freddy Forsythes writes to foind out.

it feels real becuase its based on real stuff! locations, operations, details equipment, customs, some suprising moves - this is good stuff. unputdoenable.

heavy research. and sentances to the point! its a tragedy that it highlights that the war against narconitcs is unwinable, inspit of all our best ef...more

like · see review

Jul 20, 2011 Mel rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: own

While this book has an interesting premise ... how could the United States win the war on cocaine ... it falls short of being a good read in many respects. Forsyth goes into great detail, oftentimes repeating himself, in the buildup of the plot. His heavy-handedness with details reminds me a lot of Tom Clancy, another author who's work I find difficult to read. I was excited when just over half way through the book the action starts to unfold, but that elation was short-lived and even at three-q...more

like · see review

Jan 14, 2011 Neil Wright rated it 3 of 5 stars

Freddie’s latest thriller, released at the back end of 2010. I didn’t intend on tackling another one of ‘Forsyth’s saga’s’ for a while but I got this as a present so I got stuck into as soon as I could, making the most of the quiet holidays to give it my full concentration, which is always a help with his detailed plots and threads.

Now, as book reviews go, this is one sided and biased. Fred is a personal favourite of mine and quite rightly deserves his title as ‘The Master Storyteller’, as well...more Freddie’s latest thriller, released at the back end of 2010. I didn’t intend on tackling another one of ‘Forsyth’s saga’s’ for a while but I got this as a present so I got stuck into as soon as I could, making the most of the quiet holidays to give it my full concentration, which is always a help with his detailed plots and threads.

Now, as book reviews go, this is one sided and biased. Fred is a personal favourite of mine and quite rightly deserves his title as ‘The Master Storyteller’, as well as being a fine Englishman! Anyway, after the first couple of chapters I was enthralled. So in depth, complex and contemporary the chapters could be todays news bulletins, containing fragments of factual news stories from the last couple of years, like Obama’s presidency, Cameron’s premiership and the British autistic hacker, Gary Mckinnon. Forsyth weaves his fiction around this fact and it’s great! You feel like your reading a secret report meant for the filing cabinets of the Oval Office or MI5.

The cocaine industry is the focus of the story, with the U.S. government mounting an assault on the cartels of South America. The methods of the cartel to get the drug from root source to users nostril makes for some fascinating reading. The transportation, concealment and personnel that’s required is worldwide and affects countries like the U.K. profoundly.

The characters of the novel are portrayed superbly, the villain’s cover all villainous territory from the cool calm intellectual to the rough violent psychopath. As usual with Frederick, the good guys are fellas that the average Joe think they would love to be. I’ve always thought his characters are a believable Bond. A step up from the Hollywood explosive blockbuster. Calculating, clever and clinical without the chedderness and obligatory notch on the bedpost.

If you are new to Mr F. Forsyth then you will be dazzled by his detail, awestruck by his assiduity and impressed by his intricacy. But, however, if you are familiar with titles as famous as The Day Of The Jackal, The Odessa File etc then it delivers, but delivers only what’s been before, that is my only critique and it is a small one, it will provide a satisfying finale, as ever.

Muchly enjoyed. Anxiously awaiting the Forsyth version of the Wikileaks saga!

(less)

like · see review

Oct 15, 2010 Jerry rated it 3 of 5 stars

Forsyth is one of our favorite authors, so we were looking forward to this, his latest. Even though it was clear the plot involved an all-out war on the cocaine cartel of Columbia, and the worldwide distribution of that dangerous drug, once we got beyond the tutorial on how the cocaine market works, the book settled down into actually a rather light adventure yarn about double-crossing on the land, on the sea, and in the air. The research was clearly deep, and the use of technology quite intrigu...more

like · see review

Nov 18, 2011 thewanderingjew rated it 2 of 5 stars

Perhaps if I had read the book and not listened to it in the audio version, I would have liked it better. I found it hard to give it my full attention and often drifted away, lost in my own thoughts. With 11 CD's devoting a significant portion of the disc to explanation, it became overwhelming and difficult to remain engaged. I found it tedious, at times, since it had too much detail and explanation, as it attempted to describe every aspect of the drug cartel and its methods and every minute det...more

like · see review

Jan 27, 2011 Wanda rated it 2 of 5 stars

It was just OK. Actually, I have never read a Frederick Forsyth novel that has been boring. This one is. It concerns an audacious attempt at destroying the cocaine trafficking world wide and had the president of the U.S. declaring cocaine trafficking in the same category of threats to the U.S., as a buildup of nuclear weapons of the coast of Florida might be classified. A real stretch.
I have been a great fan of this author for years. His other work always gripped my attention and they were real...more

like · see review

Mar 13, 2011 Evan Kingston rated it 1 of 5 stars

This was a Christmas present from my girlfriend's dad. Thrillers aren't normally my thing, but I thought I'd give it a try, especially after he thoughtfully explained that something totally different would give me fresh eyes for the project I'm working on. I barely made it through and hated every page, but I guess it did help strengthen my resolve and understanding of what I'm trying to do in my own writing.

The Cobra is a retired CIA agent who convinces the President to give him secret authority...more This was a Christmas present from my girlfriend's dad. Thrillers aren't normally my thing, but I thought I'd give it a try, especially after he thoughtfully explained that something totally different would give me fresh eyes for the project I'm working on. I barely made it through and hated every page, but I guess it did help strengthen my resolve and understanding of what I'm trying to do in my own writing.

The Cobra is a retired CIA agent who convinces the President to give him secret authority to use any means necessary in wiping out the international cocaine trade. The Cobra recruits operative, buys cool gadgets and war machines, and uses espionage to turn the paranoid cartels against themselves.

In the description of the novel on this site, Forsyth brags about all the research he's done, and that seems to be all the novel amounts to: a mound of facts about how drugs are hidden on boats, which European ports are best for smuggling, and how far this or that airplane can fly with or without bespoke modifications. While facts in fiction are a great tool for convincing readers that the story is real and inhabitable, I don't see much point in them past that; despite reading through tedious passages about outfitting boats with extra fuel tanks, I surely didn't learn enough to build my own drug smuggling vessel. And even if the facts you are reading about in a novel do translate into normal life, how do you know which of the sentences you've read are real-world truth and which are fictionalized for dramatic effect?

For example, I think he really misses the mark on his portrayal of cocaine users. The only users in this novel are two teenagers who die of overdoses (each event conveniently convincing someone to swear vengeance on the cartel) and a liberal judge from the Netherlands; these seem like devises to advance the plot and cement the theme than the product of reality-based research. In the novel's world, where most drug addicts are misguided kids and not adults with real problems, destroying the cartels might really work to stop drug use. But anyone who has had any experience or done any research on addiction knows that there are deeper problems at play than just pushers. What is the point of this sort of global-political conjecture in fiction, since a story can't really prove the best way to fight the war on drugs? It seems to me that fiction is better suited to show us small, personal truths on a character level.

Unfortunately, most of the cast of this novel is treated too sparsely to even qualify as characters. I had trouble feeling any investment, suspense, or even curiosity throughout because the characters were too lifeless to identify with. Somehow, the bad guys were even more boring than the good guys. Most characters are introduced with two paragraphs of biography and never become anything more than that sketch.

And even on the simple retribution level, I felt the plot fell flat. So much of the early book is descriptive research, and once things get going, many of the scenes are repetitive, as the Cobra intercepts shipment after shipment. And when scenes really get going, the narrator often slips into the pluperfect for some reason, giving all the action a played-out feel that made it even harder to care.

The surprise ending redeemed it a little bit, convincing me that Forsyth doesn't really see the world that simply and making me glad to have stuck through 300 pages. But the twist was easy to see coming, too, as the few passages comparing the Don to the Cobra were the few bright bits of subtext in an otherwise empty book.

While I was pretty sure I wouldn't like this book from the start, I genuinely tried. And I have to believe there are better political thrillers out there with writers good enough to overcome their readers' personal tastes and politics to communicate something more.(less)

like · see review

Oct 23, 2010 Atishay rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Frederick Forsyth is one of the greatest thriller writers of our modern era and this latest work by the veteran reveals the work of a pure master.
In The Cobra, Forsyth takes on the cocaine industry eating away into the American and European societies. When the President Office of US decides to do away with the cocaine industry once and for all, the executives turn to Paul Deveraux, an ex-CIA veteran, to devise and implement a strategy that can carry out the operation. Deveraux, nicknamed The Cob...more

1 like · like · see review

Jul 19, 2010 Barbara Mitchell rated it 3 of 5 stars

I won The Cobra from GoodReads. Although I hadn't read a Forsyth book for years, I remembered his thrillers as being exciting page-turners and I looked forward to reading this one. What I read is different from what I expected but still a good read.

In this story, a retired CIA operative who is known by the nickname Cobra is asked by the President of the United States (Obama since it takes place in 2011) if it is possible to destroy the international drug cartels and thus the drug business. After...more

like · see review

Feb 17, 2013 Kit Chapman added it

Shelves: fiction

The US president decides to act on the drug war and hires an experinced operative to covertly stop it. With money and resources he interfers with the drug trade in a way that the gangs in South America, Mexico, Europe and the US start fighting each other due to a shortage in cocaine and paranoia. Until....the gun deaths are not palitable in the US and the president calls it off! Then the opertive makes a deal with the head of the Columbia gang to sell him back some cocaine and he escapes to a pr...more

like · see review

Aug 12, 2010 Doc-mok rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: first-reads

I won this as a First Read from Goodreads and it is very engrossing so far. I haven't read a Forsyth book in years (totally loved The Dogs of War), and this book is what I remember Forsyth to be: intelligent, complex, and fast paced.

OK, so I'm done with the book now and find that it was a typical Forsyth, in that there is an incredible amount of research and detail that went into a lot of the book -- more than I could really take in (different kinds of planes, helicopters, and ships described in...more

like · see review

Jul 13, 2011 Guru rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Classic Forsyth novel. This one is about an all-out war on cocaine machine by a mysterious ex-spook Paul Devereaux aka The Cobra, assigned to this mission directly by the POTUS.
The Cobra surveys the cocaine industry and decides that the best way to put an end to the cocaine traffic is when it is being shipped over the sea. The Cobra books the ex-bounty hunter, ex-lawyer and Forsyth's old hack, Cal Dexter as his right hand and it is Dexter who does most of the groundwork - from co-ordinating wit...more

like · see review

Sep 26, 2010 Jay Connor rated it 4 of 5 stars

Here's my nomination for #2 in international intrigue -- behind Daniel Silva. Yes, Forsyth has been at it longer, and has some strong arguments for higher standing -- Day of the Jackal -- but Silva wins the "Ludlum-mantel" on both plot and character.

Not to say that "The Cobra" isn't strong on plot. It is. And its characters are serviceable. Great premise: what if America put all of its military might on the war on drugs? Good twists. But limited by one-turn-too-many which undercuts the prior mot...more

like · see review

Nov 08, 2012 Scott Kunes rated it 3 of 5 stars

Well let's see, how to put my feelings on this book into words. First off the premise of the book is very good if a little unrealistic. I could see an operation of this magnitude of covertness happening 50 or 60 years ago, but not in today's day and age. Secondly, the book read (in Forsythe style) like a plan rather than a narrative, perhaps he was hoping that a certain CIC would read this book and say we can do that (I don't see BO ever doing that). Speaking of BO this book somewhat read as an...more

like · see review

Feb 18, 2011 Missmath144 rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: action, audio, crime, good-reader, terrorism

The cocaine industry is quietly redesignated as a terrorist threat, which enables the United States and Britain to attempt taking it out completely. The Cobra is in charge of the operation. It is well written and interesting. For me, there was too much detailed description of the planes and ships. All that description was really a necessary part to the story to make it realistic; it was just easy to not pay attention to those details while driving the car, but zoning out for those parts didn't c...more

like · see review

May 19, 2012 Joachim rated it 5 of 5 stars

I loved this book. It set itself apart from modern thrillers right from page one with its classy and tight writing, attention to detail, and perfectly timed twists and turns.

The research that clearly went into the historical backdrop makes this a fascinating read. You'll learn all kinds of things about the drug trade and distribution system, as well as why our current efforts at fighting it are by and large ineffectual.

If you like most modern thrillers (I'm thinking of authors like Jack Higgins,...more

like · see review

Dec 24, 2012 brian dean rated it 1 of 5 stars

This is no thriller like the wonderful Day of the Jackal, Fourth Protocol or Dogs of War, all by Forsyth. There is so little immediate danger to the heroes of the story that only Forsyth's apparent intimate knowledge of how various intelligence agencies work make it interesting at all. I recently watched a man refurbish a hatchet (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCCjZE...) and his remarkable competence and confidence made the mundane work fascinating. As with Diresta, so too, Forsyth. But a story...more

like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … 99 100 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

Recommend it | Stats | Recent status updates

combine
Other Editions (32)

More editions...

Genres

Thriller

47 users

Suspense

15 users

Mystery > Crime

12 users

Action

10 users

Spy Thriller > Espionage

9 users

Mystery

8 users

War > Military

6 users

Thriller > Spy Thriller

5 users

Adult

4 users

Thriller > Mystery Thriller

4 users

See top shelves...

Readers also enjoyed similar books

About Frederick Forsyth

From Wikipedia:

Frederick Forsyth, CBE (born 25 August 1938) is an English author and occasional political commentator. He is best known for thrillers such as The Day of the Jackal, The Odessa File, The Fourth Protocol, The Dogs of War, The Devil's Alternative, The Fist of God, Icon, The Veteran, Avenger and recently The Afghan.

The son of a furrier, Forsyth was born in Ashford, Kent. He was educate...more From Wikipedia:

Frederick Forsyth, CBE (born 25 August 1938) is an English author and occasional political commentator. He is best known for thrillers such as The Day of the Jackal, The Odessa File, The Fourth Protocol, The Dogs of War, The Devil's Alternative, The Fist of God, Icon, The Veteran, Avenger and recently The Afghan.

The son of a furrier, Forsyth was born in Ashford, Kent. He was educated at Tonbridge School and later attended the University of Granada in Spain. He became one of the youngest pilots in the Royal Air Force at the age of 19, where he served on National Service from 1956 to 1958. Becoming a journalist, he joined Reuters in 1961 and later the BBC in 1965, where he served as an assistant diplomatic correspondent. From July to September 1967, he served as a correspondent covering the Nigerian Civil War between the region of Biafra and Nigeria. He left the BBC in 1968 after controversy arose over his alleged bias towards the Biafran cause and accusations that he falsified segments of his reports. Returning to Biafra as a freelance reporter, Forsyth wrote his first book, The Biafra Story in 1969.

Forsyth decided to write a novel using similar research techniques to those used in journalism. His first full length novel, The Day of the Jackal, was published in 1971 and became an international bestseller and gained its author the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel. In this book, the Organisation armée secrète (a real-life terrorist group) hires an assassin to kill the then-French President Charles de Gaulle. It was later made into a film of the same name.

In Forsyth's second novel, The Odessa File (1972), a reporter attempts to track down a certain ex-Nazi SS officer in modern Germany. The reporter discovers him via the diary of a Jewish Holocaust survivor who committed suicide earlier, but he is being shielded by an organization that protects ex-Nazis, called ODESSA. Later, the reporter discovers that this same SS officer murdered a German Army officer during World War II for striking him after refusing to let SS soldiers take the place of his own wounded men. The German Army Officer was the reporter's father. This book was later made into a movie with the same name, starring Jon Voight, but there were substantial adaptations.

In The Dogs of War (1974) a British mining executive hires a group of mercenaries to overthrow the government of an African country so that he can install a puppet regime that will allow him cheap access to a colossal platinum-ore reserve. This book was also adapted to film, in 1981, starring Christopher Walken and Tom Berenger.

The Shepherd was an illustrated novella published in 1975. It tells of a nightmare journey by an RAF pilot while flying home for Christmas in the late 1950s. His attempts to find a rational explanation for his eventual rescue prove as troublesome as his experience. Following this came The Devil's Alternative in 1979, which was set in 1982. In this book, the Soviet Union faces a disastrous grain harvest and Ukrainian freedom fighters. A Politburo faction fight ensues. In the end, a Norwegian oil tanker built in Japan, a Russian airliner hijacked to West Berlin and various governments find themselves involved.

In 1982, No Comebacks, a collection of ten short stories, was published. Some of these stories had been written earlier. Many were set in the Republic of Ireland where Forsyth was living at the time. One of them, "There Are No Snakes In Ireland", won him a second Edgar Allan Poe Award, this time for best short story.

The Fourth Protocol was published in 1984 and involves renegade elements within the Soviet Union attempting to plant a nuclear bomb near an American airbase in the UK, intending to influence the upcoming British elections and lead to the election of an anti-NATO, anti-American, anti-nuclear, pro-soviet Labour government. The Fourth Protocol was later filmed, starring Pierce Brosnan and Michael Caine, in 1987. All the (less)

More about Frederick Forsyth...

Books by Frederick Forsyth

More…

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Trivia About The Cobra

No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »

title link	preview: The Cobra
avg rating	preview: The Cobra Goodreads rating: 3.43 (2053 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7774883-the-cobra?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348589597l/7774883.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7774883-the-cobra?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]The Cobra by Frederick Forsyth[/url]

The Cobra

Friend Reviews

Community Reviews

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website