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Very interesting. A similar point was made in ‘The Sunday Times’ article.
That said, fans would and did perceive Fleming adjusting his formula as an evolution of the master’s recipe whereas If an ‘outsider’ were to do it, it would doubtless be perceived as outright treachery.
PussyNoMore thinks that the continuation game is a poisoned chalice. There are so many constituencies to please: The family, the publisher, the literary fans, the movie fans, thriller readers - the list is long.
That said, the money is probably pretty good and if anybody can walk through this veritable mine field, Horowitz is the man to do it. His predecessors have all lost literary limbs on the way.
“007 Forever. Politically Correct Never”
I've read Horowitz's books since I was a kid, and quite like his writing and work - Bond and non-Bond. TM wasn't for everyone, of course, and with a continuation book it will be difficult to please everyone.
Maybe it is because many thinking aficionados like what he did with TM.
PussyNoMore certainly did.
“007 Forever. Politically Correct Never”
@PussyNoMore's new campaign slogan.
It s also a bit funny to negate Fleming just for the sake of political correctness. As for "fan fiction", what else can you call it?
Thunderfinger, maybe PussyNoMore is getting a little confused but didn’t you say in a previous post that you hadn’t read ‘Trigger Mortis’ ?
And what part did you particularly like ?
I liked the beginning. The way AH described life in the service and interactions there. That s about it, really.
How Bond became 007: Anthony Horowitz takes us right back to the origins of Ian Fleming's famous hero (May 20)
by David Mills
If you have ever worried why James Bond prefers his martinis shaken rather than the more orthodox stirred, or wondered where he got his gun-metal cigarette case from, or why he buys his fags from Morland, then this is the book for you.
After the lacklustre run of Bond sequels by John Gardner and Raymond Benson, 10 years ago the Fleming Estate reinvigorated the franchise by commissioning Sebastian Faulks to write a new 007 adventure. Faulks had the inspired idea to set Devil May Care in 1967. This promising start was spoilt by their next commission, the American Jeffery Deaver, whose Carte Blanche takes place in 2011. Next up, William Boyd went historical again with Solo, featuring a marvellously irritable, middle-aged Bond in 1969.
The baton passed to Anthony Horowitz in 2015. He stuck with the past and set the frenetic Trigger Mortis in 1957, immediately following on from Fleming's Goldfinger. His latest effort goes back to 1950 and is a prequel to the first Bond novel, Casino Royale. In comic book terms, then, it's an "origins story": so we learn how Bond got his "Double-O" status as well as the answers to those other vital questions.
Sadly it's very formulaic. Anyone who has read more than a couple of the post-Fleming Bond novels knows that we are going to get references to his knitted tie, love of scrambled eggs and heather honey, Scottish housekeeper, scarred cheek, moccasin shoes… There's (much, much) more but that's enough. Then there's the customary sequence of scenes — meeting with M, travel to foreign location, hang out in casino, drink martini, have sex, sneak up on installation that turns out not to be an innocent industrial concern after all but the heart of the villain's dastardly enterprise heavily guarded by goons in logoed uniforms, where, of course, Bond is spotted and causes havoc while escaping.
Oh yes, and there's a grotesque baddie, in this instance a horribly fat Corsican gangster called Scipio. We learn early on that he likes to "pulverise his enemies using his own weight and body mass" — no prizes for guessing whom Scipio will end up torturing in his signature style before the end.
The novel opens with "So, 007 is dead". A Savile Row-suited body is pulled out of a dock in Marseilles (oh you tease, Mr Horowitz) and a new agent is sent to investigate. This is his replacement, the young James Bond. The elements of the mystery are that the heroin supply, run by Corsican gangsters, seems to have dried up, and a mysterious freelance agent known as "Madame 16", who worked for the British during the war, is on the scene, as well as a super-rich American industrialist.
Exposition is clunkingly shovelled in: "Quickly, Bond examined the other players" signals a run through of characters at the gaming table; "James Bond thought about the man he had come to kill" introduces two pages of background information. There are moments so clumsy, you groan: "Chimiques is French for chemicals," says one fluent French speaker to another. A French baker meets a woman "who calls herself Madame 16": no, she is "Sixtine"; to a French baker "16" would make her Madame Seize. Bond stands "well out of her line of vision" yet still manages to notice "a flicker of excitement in Sixtine's eyes".
Then Bond has the bad luck to be caught out by a small, poor Corsican boy who went deaf aged six, but "could lip-read in three languages". What are the odds? Still, if you can put all that behind you, it is a fun read — the well-worked-out plot is nicely twisting, even managing a surprise at the end, and there's also some original, unpublished Fleming material in one chapter. Horowitz excels at action sequences and more than a third of the novel is taken up with car chases, shoot-outs, fights and explosions, so it's by no means all bad.
The next book needs to get away from the Bond checklist and formulaic structure. Fleming was much freer with his creation. Bond is absent for the first third of From Russia, with Love; The Spy Who Loved Me is narrated by a Canadian woman trapped by gangsters in a New England motel, until a passing stranger (guess who?) chances to drop by and sort them out; in the short story Quantum of Solace, Bond merely listens to an account of an unhappy marriage.
The character is so established that the novels no longer need the props and clichéd scenes. So, if Horowitz has had enough, they should try a more adventurous writer — Jon McGregor, David Peace, or Sarah Waters — that would stir 007 up, or should it be shake?
True.
We shall see what transpires albeit, PussyNoMore thinks that the “French Stuff” should have been picked up by a diligent editor!
Confidence levels remain high.
Heck no, I want more. Unless Blofeld remains his stepbrother in that case I pass.
I'd be happy with one adult aged 007 novel a year, taking place in a contemporary setting.
I am a fan of Deaver but I agree that his usual style was a tad much.
Agreed, what i found most arrogant about that review is, how casualy he spoiled many elements of it... as if no one would want to read it anyway after seeing his review. Thats why i stopped mid way, not worth it.
I jumped past reading the interview for that reason. will read it once I've had a chance to read the book.
…And ORDER it! Damn, I need to get around to do that.
The novel opens with "So, 007 is dead". A Savile Row-suited body is pulled out of a dock in Marseilles (oh you tease, Mr Horowitz)
Made it quite clear he doesn't like Horowitz. And as for knowing his Fleming, well like you say, is Spy really the best example to offer? Fleming himself virtually disowned it.
I wish one would come out every year as well. That would give us a lot of good new content to talk about.
I'm reading 'A High Time To Kill' now. I REALLY love Raymond Benson's books. I highly recommend them.
Horowitz’s track record with continuation works: ‘House Of Silk’, ‘Moriarity’, & ‘Trigger Mortis’ more than instills confidence.
The spy genre is on fire right now with the likes of Le Carre, Herron, Kanon all scoring massive hits and with new works on the horizon from Cumming and Porter there are spies around every corner.
It will be interesting to see if FAAD benefits from this resurgence in the genre. It would be great if literary Bond garnered new fans and more people discovered the wonders of Fleming.
“007 Forever, Politically Correct Never”
Quite Revelator, it would be a brave woman or man who would make such an assertion!
The Pussy constantly vacillates between MR, FRWL & OHMSS as to which is his favourite.
That said, Horowitz would probably have to have a three to four book run of success before he’d dare write a Bond book that doesn’t see 007 appear until the second act.
Then he’d have to get it passed the family !
Indeed, IFP’s role in all of this puzzles The Pussy. Given the fact that they subjected us to DMC, Solo and the particularly appalling CB they can hardly be held up as the arbitrators of good taste.
In fact, one has the feeling that they went to Horowitz out of desperation when their love affair with the literati ended with plummeting sales.
That said, they and he probably felt that TM needed to be a good Bond book that ticked all the boxes before they became more creative.
Hopefully FAAD being a prequel is the start of Horowitz mining a more creative vein and we’ll see him continuing to bring us some surprises.
As an aside, is PussyNoMore alone in considering it strange that the precise nature of the original Fleming content has not been trailed in advance as ‘Murder On Wheels’ was ?