Ben Coes is a novelist and writer from the United States, born in Hartford, Connecticut, on September 10, 1966.
Coes began his career as a White House intern under President Ronald Reagan. Later, he became a speechwriter for former Secretary of Energy James D. Watkins. He wrote speeches for T. Boone Pickens. He also managed Mitt Romney’s campaign for governor of Massachusetts in 2002.
Ben and his family founded Thrillers for America’s Best in 2013. It is a non-profit that provides novels to Veterans in Virginia homes and hospitals in the US.
Coes is currently associated with The Mustang Group, a private equity business. The business has invested in several firms, leveraged buyouts, and manages middle-sized enterprises.
Coes began his writing career in 2010, quickly becoming a best-selling author thanks to his novel, Power Down. The protagonist of the novel is Dewey Andreas who fights terrorists targeting American energy resources. Coup d’Etat, his second book, is a follow-up to Power Down. His other popular books include The Last Refuge, Eye for an Eye, Independence Day, First Strike, Trap the Devil, and Bloody Sunday.
Currently, Coes lives with his wife and four children in Wellesley, Massachusetts.
See also: Ben Coes’s Dewey Andreas Books in Order.
Ben Coes Books in order
- Power Down (2010)
- Coup d’Etat (2011)
- The Last Refuge (2012)
- Eye for an Eye (2013)
- Independence Day (2015)
- First Strike: A Thriller (2016)
- Trap the Devil: A Thriller (2017)
- Bloody Sunday: A Thriller (2018)
- The Island: A Thriller (2021)
Similar authors
- Brad Taylor‘s Pike Logan series follows veteran operator Pike Logan and his partner, Jennifer Cahill. They fight in a clandestine team created to eliminate threats posed by America’s enemies.
- Brad Thor’s Scot Harvath series tells the story of Scot Harvath, ex-Navy SEAL Secret Service agent as, first, he rescues President Rutledge and saves his daughter, and later becomes a covert counter-terrorism agent.
- Jack Carr’s Terminal List follows James Reece, the former Navy SEAL. He has nothing left to live for after he discovers that the government is behind the deaths of his team.
Most recommended books:
- The Island (Dewey Andreas #9) (4.50 Goodreads score)
- Independence Day (Dewey Andreas, #5) (4.43 Goodreads score)
- First Strike (Dewey Andreas, #6) (4.43 Goodreads score)
- Trap the Devil (Dewey Andreas, #7) (4.41 Goodreads score)
- Eye for an Eye (Dewey Andreas, #4) (4.41 Goodreads score)
Latest releases
Ben Coes’s last Dewey Andreas Novel, The Island, was released in 2021. Dewey Andreas, the hero of Ben Coes’ popular New York Times series, returned to The Island on April 17th, 2021.
Book summaries
Power Down (2010)
A major North American hydroelectric dam is blown up and the largest off-shore oil field in this hemisphere is destroyed in a brutal, coordinated terrorist attack. But there was one factor that the terrorists didn’t take into account when they struck the Capitana platform off the coast of Colombia—slaughtering much of the crew and blowing up the platform—and that was the Capitana crew chief Dewey Andreas. Dewey, former Army Ranger and Delta, survives the attack, rescuing as many of his men as possible. But the battle has just begun.While the intelligence and law enforcement agencies scramble to untangle these events and find the people responsible, the mysterious figure of Alexander Fortuna—an agent embedded into the highest levels of American society and business—sets into play the second stage of these long-planned attacks. The only fly in the ointment is Dewey Andreas—who is using all his long-dormant skills to fight his way off the platform, then out of Colombia and back to the U.S., following the trail of terrorists and operatives sent to stop him. Power Down is a gripping, compelling debut thriller from Ben Coes, a powerful new author, an amazing talent certain to join the ranks of the genre’s finest writers.
Coup d’Etat (2011)
Wanting only a peaceful, obscure life, Dewey Andreas has gone to rural Australia, far from turbulent forces that he once fought against. But powerful men, seeking revenge, have been scouring the earth looking for Dewey. And now, they’ve finally found him – forcing Dewey to abandon his home and to fight for his life against a very well armed, well trained group of assassins.Meanwhile, a radical cleric has been elected president of Pakistan and, upon taking power, sets off a rapidly escalating conflict with India. As the situation spins quickly out of control, it becomes clear that India is only days from resorting to a nuclear response, one that will have unimaginably disasterous results for the world at large. With only days to head this off, the President sends in his best people, including Jessica Tanzer, to do whatever it takes to restore the fragile peace to the region. Tanzer has only one viable option – to set up and execute a coup d’etat in Pakistan – and only one man in mind to lead the team that will try to pull off this almost unimaginable task in the nerve-wrackingly short time frame, Dewey Andreas. If, that is, Jessica can even get to Dewey and if Dewey can get out of Australia alive…
The Last Refuge (2012)
Off a quiet street in Brooklyn, New York, Israeli Special Forces commander Kohl Meir is captured by operatives of the Iranian secret service, who smuggle Meir back to Iran, where he is imprisoned, tortured, and prepared for a show trial.What they don’t know is that Meir was in New York to recruit Dewey Andreas for a secret operation. Meir had been tipped off that Iran had finally succeeded in building their first nuclear weapon, one they were planning to use to attack Israel. His source was a high-level Iranian government official and his proof was a photo of the bomb itself.Dewey Andreas, a former Army Ranger and Delta, owes his life to Meir and his team of Israeli commandos. Now, to repay his debt, Dewey has to attempt the impossible —to both rescue Meir from one of the world’s most secure prisons and to find and eliminate Iran’s nuclear bomb before it’s deployed—all without the help or sanction of Israel or America (at the near certain risk of detection by Iran).Unfortunately, Dewey’s first moves have caught the attention of Abu Paria, the brutal and brilliant head of VEVAK, the Iranian secret service. Now Dewey has to face off against, outwit, and outfight an opponent with equal cunning, skill, and determination, with the fate of millions hanging in the balance.
Eye for an Eye (2013)
When Dewey Andreas uncovers the identity of a mole embedded at a high level in Israel’s Mossad, it triggers a larger, more dangerous plot. The mole was the most important asset of Chinese Intelligence, and Fao Bhang, head of China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS), responds to the discovery and brutal elimination of the mole, by immediately placing a kill order on the man responsible—Dewey Andreas.Dewey is tracked to Argentina, where he is on vacation with his fiancée, Jessica Tanzer, a U.S. National Security Advisor. A top-level kill team is sent in quickly and quietly, but their attack fails to take out Dewey. The collateral damage, however, is both horrifying and deeply personal. With nothing left to lose, Andreas is determined to have his revenge. Once he learns who is probably behind the attack—and why they are after him—Dewey goes rogue, using all of his assets and skills to launch a counterattack. Andreas must now face the full weight and might of the MSS, Chinese Intelligence, and the formidable Fao Bhang, if he’s to achieve his one last goal: revenge on a biblical scale, no matter the odds or the armies that he will have to fight his way through. Andreas—former Army Ranger and Delta—is a man of great skills and cunning. His opponent, Fao Bhang, is ruthless, determined, and with no limit to the assets at his disposal.
Independence Day (2015)
Cloud, a high-level Russian hacker, perhaps the best in the world, has acquired a nuclear weapon. It’s an older bomb from the USSR’s Cold War arsenal with the power to devastate a major city. Fueled by a dark and personal vendetta, Cloud has put it onto an anonymous trawler, piloted by jihadists, headed straight to America.Dewey Andreas, former Delta working as an agent for the C.I.A., is still drowning in grief after the tragic murder of his fiancée. Dewey has lost his focus, his edge, and the confidence of his superiors.Learning of the missing loose nuke and picking up chatter about an impending terrorist attack on American shores, the best and most talented C.I.A. agents are now chasing both Cloud and the bomb. Acting on credible intel, two highly trained teams are sent into Russia in a two-pronged mission to grab Cloud. But it’s a trap, and now America’s last hope of stopping the bomb is an unofficial agent gone rogue-Dewey Andreas.With only three days left, Dewey Andreas must find the elusive Cloud. To do so, Dewey will risk everything to find the most dangerous and skilled enemy he’s yet faced. For if he fails, American will suffer its most deadly terrorist attack on the Fourth of July-Independence Day.
First Strike: A Thriller (2016)
Deep within the Pentagon, a covert, multi-billion arms-for-influence program was created. The objective was to protect the United States and its allies from terrorist acts by secretly enabling a hand-picked man to emerge as the most powerful leader in the Middle East. But the charismatic Tristan Nazir double-crosses America, twisting the program for his own violent ends to create ISIS. Now America is at great risk.
Trap the Devil: A Thriller (2017)
A group of some of the most powerful people in the government, the military, and the private sector, has begun a brutal plan to quietly take over the reins of the U.S. government. They’ve begun to remove the people who stand in their way—and replace them with their own sympathizers and puppets. They’ve already taken out the Speaker of the House—whose death was made to look like an accidental drowning—and the president and vice president are next. Once they have their own people in place, they plan to start a bloody, brutal war on an unimaginable scale.On restricted duty while he recovers from injuries incurred on a previous mission, Dewey Andreas is sent to Paris by CIA Director Hector Calibrisi. The Secretary of State is going there for secret talks, and Dewey is to be an extra layer of security above the State Department team. But what should be an easy mission couldn’t go more wrong. The cabal has sent in a hit man to take out the Secretary of State and lay the blame for this murder at the feet of Dewey himself.With the Secretary of State dead, shot by Dewey’s weapon, Dewey is on the run and out in the cold, desperately trying to unravel the plot before the conspirators succeed in killing millions of innocents.
Bloody Sunday: A Thriller (2018)
North Korea, increasingly isolated from most of the rest of the world, is led by an absolute dictator and a madman with a major goal—he’s determined to launch a nuclear attack on the United States. While they have built, and continue to successfully test nuclear bombs, North Korea has yet to develop a ballistic missile with the range necessary to attack America. But their missiles are improving, reaching a point where the U.S. absolutely must respond.What the U.S. doesn’t know is that North Korea has made a deal with Iran. In exchange for effective missiles from Iran, they will trade nuclear triggers and fissionable material. An exchange, if it goes through, that will create two new nuclear powers, both with dangerous plans.Dewey Andreas, still reeling from recent revelations about his own past, is ready to retire from the CIA. But he’s the only available agent with the skills to carry out the CIA’s plan to stop North Korea. The plan is to inject a singular designer poison into the head of the North Korean military and in exchange for the nuclear plans, provide him with the one existing dose of the antidote. But it goes awry when Dewey manages to inject a small amount of the poison into himself. Now, to survive, Dewey must get into North Korea and access the antidote and, while there, thwart the nuclear ambitions of both North Korea and Iran. And he has less than 24 hours to do so—in the latest thriller from Ben Coes.
The Island: A Thriller (2021)
America is about to face the deadliest terrorist attack on it’s soil since 9/11. Iran has been planning a revenge attack for years, with three goals in mind. Bring America to its knees. Assassinate the popular U.S. President J. P. Dellenbaugh. And neutralize their most successful agent, Dewey Andreas.The first pre-emptive attack against Dewey Andreas fails but it worries the head of the CIA enough that he sends Dewey out of town and off the grid. But as intelligence analysts work as fast as they can to unravel the chatter on terrorist networks, Muhammed el-Shakib, head of Iran’s military and intelligence agency, launches a bold strike. When the President arrives in New York to address the U.N., embedded terrorist assets blow up the bridges and tunnels that connect Manhattan to the mainland. Taking control of the island with it’s hidden forces, they race to the U.N. in search of Dellenbaugh and to launch an even deadlier attack that will wreak unimaginable destruction on the country itself.While a shocked country struggles to mount a counter-attack, a hopeless, outmanned and outgunned Dewey Andreas sneaks onto the island of Manhattan to fight a seemingly impossible battle.
