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If not, there are several shops within walking distance where you can pick up a copy.
Great, thank you!
If he got the opportunity, there's the possibility of Horowitz delivering an even better book and that would be awesome for all JB fans. Flood the Ian Fleming website with email praise!
The novel gives it context. I thought it was awful before, but the novel sells it as a title.
Yes, I believe that that was mentioned by Fleming in Moonraker (1955) and of course Trigger Mortis was partially based on the unused Fleming Bond screen treatment 'Murder on Wheels'. John Gardner also used a racetrack for action scene in his second Bond continuation novel For Special Services (1982). Gardner also develops the car racing connection by mentioning real-life racers in his third Bond novel Icebreaker (1983).
Ha ha.
And BTW I do hope Horowitz gets contract for more books. He's as good as we are going to get and I do like having new Bond books to read, except for the Deaver book.
My only gripe is the style and prose isn't as detailed as Fleming in parts, and some of it feels a little sketchy, jumping too quickly, but that at least was very similar to Fleming's short stories. The closest style to one of the Fleming novels is DAF (as someone mentioned earlier).
Don't know, sorry. I almost ordered this when it first hit the Waterstones online store but together with postage it would have cost around 35 pounds to have it shipped to Shanghai where I am currently living so I decided against it. It would be nice to read that Fleming material though. Pity no one wants to take a photo of it and post it in this thread. :)
What a great wife ! You're doing the cooking tonight ! ;)
I am not finding her interesting at all. Just kind of meh at this point.
Still got about 70 pages to go. Pages are turning fine. Will finish today.
Horowitz has made effort here to work with a Bond formula to some extent. There are familiar elements. Maybe a good tact for a first effort, but going forward I think the trick really is just get the character right. That is most important thing. If that can be done, and he is pretty close, then you have creative license to go off in any direction really.
He can make these books, Fleming inspired ,Horowitz Bond books.
That's all we need is the spirit of Fleming infusing the author's own creative vision.
I would keep references to Fleming's work to a minimum. Yes, a touch here and there, but too much and it gets a little cute.
No need really to follow formula. Familiar movie elements seem to have crept into the book a bit. The movies are best ignored when penning Bond.
I think he should take the Gardner approach and really put his own stamp on things, but maybe with more of a Fleming vibe than Gardner had.
But what worked well with the Gardner books, is that he really did make them his own.
Still felt it a little sketchy in parts, and some of the words used didn't feel like the kind words Fleming would choose. The last sentence at the end of each chapter didn't really have the flair that Fleming brought, to entice the reader on to the next chapter.
I also found some of the descriptions during action sequences a little confusing too, not being able to place exactly where Bond is or what is happening.
Other than that though, the best of the continuation novels so far, and I wouldn't mind if he wrote another one.
Fleming took us to worlds we didn't have access to, would bring us right in. He'd jazz things up for dramatic, sensationalized effect, whilst seeming to keep things real.
He had a deft touch that way. Much the way @birdleson describes Fleming's exaggeration of Americanisms.
I grew up in Toronto, yet when Bond came to Toronto in TSWLM, Fleming made the city more exotic and dangerous that it really is, at least I think so. Maybe Fleming caught a vibe that I never sensed, just being a reglar chump growing up in the suburbs and venturing downtown when need be, but I think the reader appreciates Flemings attempts at making Bond's travels as exotic and stimulating as can be.
In closing I'm excited to finally start reading this, but Waterstones is the damn worst bookstore I've ever had the misfortune of dealing with. Awful customer service.
Better than regular HC most of us will pick-up
Enjoyed it. I thought the third act was a little hard to follow:
MAJOR SPOILERS - do not look if you've not read the novel!
Page 289:
"... he had landed awkwardly, his ribs resting on one of the rails."
I know nothing about trains and how the lines are powered but it was a tad convenient how Bond's rail wasn't electrified but the third rail was!
The final encounter with the SPECTRE driver seemed a little far fetched. I sort of got the impression the guy was hideously burned - looked like a mummy, covered in bandages :D but somehow he can leave hospital (I assume in a German hospital) and travel all the way to London and find Bond!
But overall I liked it a lot. The action scenes were done very well - the
8 out of 10.