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Immediately upon Bond's arrival, Drax keeps up his loud blend of jovial and obnoxious taunting, calling Bond a "ruddy spy" and asking whether he's spent his money yet. Fleming really makes you hate his villains.
As with Vesper, Bond is relieved by the professionalism he sees in Brand.
The elderly Dr. Walter ("Valter") gives off the vibe of a spry, black-haired Hans Glaub. "Doesn't drink or smoke...hardly breathes...thinks of nothing but the rocket. Do you, my friend?" A little movie Largo there.
I love how horribly slimy Fleming makes Krebs: "the touch of a slightly damp hand...the slug-like neck..." Mein Gott. "A youthful version of Peter Lorre," Fleming describes him.
It's interesting that Bond finds himself taken in by Drax's charisma. If I recall correctly, I believe Bond finds himself trusting Drax and trying to decide between Krebs or Walter as the mastermind infiltrator. Which puts the reader in the unfortunate position of being ahead of Bond. Even for a first time reader, Fleming sets Drax up so obviously as the villain (lavishing his standard one and a half pages worth of horrifically grotesque physical description upon the man) that to cast red herrings at either Bond or the reader is a perfectly futile exercise. Also, Bond seems awfully quick to start thinking highly of Drax again. Cheating Blades patrons out of their money and fiendishly vulgar behavior not enough?
Bond's powers of observation are remarkable. After being given the cold shoulder and taking the span of a dinner conversation to size up Gala's appearance, he surmises she must be quite passionate beneath her cool exterior. I guess you can chalk that up to the "little" he knows about women.
12. The Moonraker
Great opening image, comparing being inside the rocket silo to "being inside the polished barrel of a huge gun." It's just the perfect image for Fleming's world.
Bond's admiration for Drax grows in the presence of the Moonraker, him wondering "how he could ever have been put off by Drax's childish behavior at the card-table." He dismisses it by thinking "Even the greatest men have their weaknesses." Bond sure does a lot of mental legwork to convince himself Drax is really a swell guy and just needs to behave like a bastard occasionally to let off the tension. To his credit, Fleming puts in the writing to convince the reader Drax is ok in Bond's book.
Love how Drax ****s with the stuffy old Dr. Walter, calling him over in front of Bond and joking that the rocket launch will be like committing murder. Fleming describes the Doctor's reaction perfectly: "a look of puzzled incredulity." Then once Drax reveals the joke, Walter awkwardly laughs it off too: "Murder. Yes, that is good. Ha! ha!" Fleming really did have such a wonderful sense of humor at times. This is another of those moments I'd love to see played out on film.
I love this tremendously bizarre detail of Drax's team all having close-shaved heads and "luxuriant" mustaches. Not scraggly little mustaches either, but ones that have been carefully groomed into handlebars, Hitlers, walruses, etc. Speaks to how well this has all been planned out in advance. In this current fad of crazy mustache and beard grooming, this would probably play well in a film too (TWINE having just touched on the concept already).
Nice description of the suicide: "One of these robots had blown his top." So nice in fact that Fleming has Bond reflect on how nice it is.
Fleming really goes into great detail on the workings of the rocket. I'm not sure how sound it all is (probably very), but it was clearly well researched and has me convinced. It strikes me that (by contrast with the tragic love story of CR and the escapist adventure with an extra helping of sadism in LALD) in addition to MR's UK setting and isolated murder-mystery plot, all the business about the rocket makes it all feel almost science fiction, just a step into the future. It sounds pretty futuristic for the 50s—this towering, gleaming weapon positioned on the cliffs of Dover. Makes me think of 50s sci-fi films like The Day the Earth Stood Still.
13. Dead Reckoning
Nice pulpish way to kick off the chapter: "On Wednesday morning Bond woke early in the dead man's bed."
Great bit of detective work here: Bond going through Tallon's things in the middle of the night and trying to put everything together. Quite an evocative scene with Bond looking out the window across the sea and the moon high in the sky. MR really has such a wonderful setting.
At the Café Royal, Bond orders "a plate of scrambled eggs and bacon and plenty of coffee to be ready in half an hour." Knew he would get it in there somewhere, somehow.
14. Itching Fingers
I believe this is the first time we've left Bond to take on another character's loose POV for an extended amount of pages—settling down with Gala for a bit here. I really like this insight we get into her mind, which helps greatly in explaining why she has been so peculiarly cool toward Bond.
Her interior monologue on Bond makes evident what of the character survived in Miranda Frost. She even thinks: "But what good could he do down here without any beautiful spies to make love to."
15. Rough Justice
Fleming has Bond reflect upon what the reader is thinking already: My, suspicion fell fast and hard upon Krebs from all corners. I wonder if perhaps one of Fleming's readers pointed this out to him, leading him to grant Bond this thought.
Knowing the plot, you're able to see what Drax's words and actions really amount to under the surface, what he's really thinking about when he rubs his hands together with "almost childish pleasure." I take back what I mentioned earlier about Bond being a step behind the reader, because even though the reader rightfully suspects Drax, the reader still has no idea what Drax's plot really is. That's the one thing (well, one of a few things) in MR that really takes the reader by surprise. It's a pretty marvelously crafted novel from that viewpoint.
Bond lies to Drax about looking at the firing point. Earlier he gave a "non-committal nod" to Drax's comments on Krebs. His suspicions are beginning to creep to the surface.
Bond's thoughts on Gala are as lascivious and as detailed as ever—"the curve of her ivory throat sweeping down into the plain white shirt...the impudent pride of the jutting breasts, swept up by the thrown-back head and shoulders"—occasionally tempered by the acknowledgement that "half" of her is a highly capable and well trained member of Special Branch. "Of course...there is always the other half."
Along with Bond's takedown of Tee-Hee in the previous book, his assault on Krebs appears to me to be one of the most viciously described attacks by Bond in all of Fleming. The way he kicks the crouching man from behind with "all his force," sending him screaming "into the front of the mahogany dressing-table," his head connecting "so hard that the heavy piece of furniture rocked on its base," and landing in a humiliating "inert spreadeagle on the floor." It's almost comical, the viciousness in the details, and (could be wrong) Fleming seems to abandon such elaborately detailed attacks by Bond from here on out. I'm not saying neither Tee-Hee nor Krebs didn't deserve what they got, but the details add up to a rather startling picture of viciousness.
I'd actually forgotten what Bond says to Krebs upon waking him: "I'll beat the daylights out of you until this [the empty Vichy bottle] breaks and then use the neck for some plastic surgery." Holy crap! The only Bond I can picture saying that is LTK Dalton on his meanest day. Maybe. I actually really like that line.
And Krebs' hilarious response surely only squeaked past the censors for being written in another language: "Leck mich am Arsch." (!)
You can always watch another Bond film. That forbidden fruit, eh?
Unless there are more deaths.
That was great to do for Roger, so of course I mean it in jest @Birdleson. Believe me, I'm right there with you. The first thing I wanted to do after reading both Casino and Live & Let Die was to watch those movies. Reading the source does engage one to pursue the adaptations of them, no matter how faithful or not they end up being. In those two examples I find them successful for different reasons, the former for adapting a lot of the meat and mood of the book and the latter for at least keeping a lot of the fear and occult tone of the source to great effect.
In my case, I saw the movie first. It might have pleased a small child, but even at 12 I thought it was too silly and that taking Bond into space didn't feel right. When I read the book a few years later, I was delighted to find a completely "new" Bond story, with a vastly more interesting villain and a far more credible plot, whose resolution hadn't been spoiled by the movie. I can only imagine how horrible it must have been to have read and loved the book and then watch a movie that discarded everything of worth in it. I'm glad to have read the book after the film.
Yes, the films didn't catch up it until Quantum of Solace, and even then the material worked better with Gala. The film came off as bit puritan, whereas the final pages of MR are very satisfying in a melancholy way. "The man who is only a silhouette." A perfect summation of OO7.
A tremendous ending unequalled in Bond (though some come close; Fleming was generally very good with his endings).
Both would be wonderful to see. We have gotten a lot of Fleming into the films piecemeal, but a solid, film-wide adaptation of unused material (in the vein of CR '06) would be incredible.
Another of my all-time favorite Fleming chapters. There's such a sense of romance here between Bond and Gala as they walk among the wildflowers. More so in my opinion than what we saw between Bond and Vesper, where their relationship was storm-clouded by fits and tears and distrust, or Bond and Solitaire, where their relationship was largely physical.
I love this whole bit about the screaming flower, the blood of it on Gala's hands, Bond taking the blood off her hands (bits of that definitely found their way into CR). The dialogue is just so perfectly written, so perfectly romantic, and Fleming of course ties it all in to a discussion of Bond's profession.
Fleming actually does a fair amount of hopping in and out of different characters' perspectives in MR, particularly with Gala. I don't recall him doing this quite as frequently in either CR or LALD. Generally, authors will stick with one character's POV for the novel—or at least for the length of a chapter or section, transitioning carefully from one character's perspective to another when they need to. Fleming does it at will. For the most part it works, though I'll admit once or twice we suddenly wound up in Gala's perspective without my having realized it. Probably wasn't reading closely enough.
I do love all of Gala's thoughts on her life, her surroundings, on Bond, wondering "Did he have moments of longing for the peaceful simple things of life?"
Great moment where Bond tries to envision how he might conceivably infiltrate the launch silo from the sea with six men and anti-tank weapons on a suicide run with cover fire from a submarine.
Bond mischievously swims up from below and plants a kiss on Gala before submerging and swimming off again. Fleming really plays the reader well. I recall coming back to this chapter, among others, after finishing the book for the first time to look for what I had missed. You have to hand it to the man, Fleming pulled off the sleight of hand, starting all the way back with M's first throwaway comment about "the usual yarn about being engaged."
Amidst this burgeoning "romance," Fleming continues to paint his breathtaking literary landscapes: "the snarling milk-white teeth of England...the black and white confetti of the ravens and gulls tossed against the vivid backcloth of green fields." The way Fleming could paint a picture...
I love how, right at the moment of the explosion, Bond is "dreamily watching" two seagulls playing with each other in flight near their clifftop nest. "They would crane and bow in their love-play...and then the male would soar out and away and at once back to the ledge to take up his lovemaking again." This is Bond and Gala in Bond's mind, and fittingly, tragically, the explosion cuts short these gulls' aerial "lovemaking" and completely destroys their nest. Beautiful foreshadowing.
After the explosion and cliff collapse—a tremendously well written scene in and of itself—Bond is so concerned for Gala, "the terrible white scarecrow that minutes before had been one of the most beautiful girls he had ever seen," that his body staves off the need to be "rackingly sick" until he's assured she's alive.
17. Wild Surmises
Some great descriptions to emphasize the enormity of the cliff collapse: "they scrambled and slid down off the mountain of chalk," "a single lump of chalk as big as a small motor-car," "the hell that had almost engulfed them."
That whole sequence of the cliff-fall felt incredibly reminiscent of the avalanche that buries Bond and Elektra in TWINE: how Bond throws himself over the girl to protect her, the panic, having to burrow their way out. I'm grateful for how much of MR P&W have worked into the films, though as with others, I'm sure, I'd prefer to have all of MR on film at once rather than piecemeal.
I like Gala's response to Bond's reasoning as to why they can't simply report the assassination attempt as a means of shutting down the Moonraker: "Don't be ridiculous. It's what we're paid for. Of course we'll take them on. And I agree we'd get nowhere with London." She's intelligent, sensible, perceptive, professional, and determined. All traits Bond admires in a woman, and reading this, my own admiration for Gala increases all the more.
Hugely comical scene here where Bond and Gala enter the dining hall: Drax pausing mid-bite and "unnoticed, the food slid[ing] off the fork and [falling] with a soft, distinct 'plep' on to the edge of the table." Just the use of the sound effect "plep" is so perfect. Krebs too, spilling red wine down his yellow shirt. Then when Bond casually, provocatively, asks about the cliff-fall, Krebs' head face-plants on the table! It's a comedy. I love Fleming in comedy mode.
And what Walter calls Krebs is even more shocking than the earlier German. Even in a foreign language I'm kind of astonished the censors let that be printed in 1955. Then again, people didn't exactly have Google Translate back then.
Bond still unknowingly working at the problem from the wrong angle: thinking to himself that he only needs to see the Moonraker successfully fired and then they're in the clear.
Great reveal before Part Three: "There had been something very disquieting about the dinner-table downstairs. It had been laid for only three people." First lines and last lines are always important, and Fleming does them so very well.
18. Beneath the Flat Stone
Never have liked this overly self-conscious thought process Fleming provides to convey Gala's fear: "So one's heart really does go into one's throat. How extraordinary. Such a commonplace and yet there it is and it really does almost stop one breathing." Yeah come on, she just discovered London is about to be destroyed; this is NOT what she is thinking right now.
I do like Fleming's crystal ball description of Gala, however: "her body a twisted black potato crisp amongst a million others..." Quite the image there.
19. Missing Person
Interesting detail about the selling wave that's weakening the pound all of a sudden having been started by Drax's company in Tangier. Sort of like Le Chiffre playing the stock market in CR.
This meeting with M in London before the big climax reminds me of OHMSS (the film). Just structurally.
I do like that M asks if there's anything he can do to help Bond. He can be cold at times, but he does have the interests of both Bond and England at heart.
Haha, did women really faint that much in the 50s? When Vallance is discussing Gala's disappearance with Bond, he throws out the possibility she may have just had a fainting fit. In literature (50s and earlier) women seem to be constantly fainting. Now I'll admit I've seen three girls faint on separate occasions in my time (and no men), but you don't see women dropping all over the place today. Maybe it's the yoga classes? ;)
Lovely description of "each dark conjecture" landing "like a vulture on Bond's shoulder and [croaking] into his ear that he had been a blind fool. Blind, blind, blind." Another case of Fleming drawing upon naturalistic/deathlike imagery.
20. Drax's Gambit
Perfectly bizarre scene of Krebs sweet-talking to the homing machine as he wipes and twists its dials. Fleming sure wants you to get that he is one strange, warped puppy.
The chase sequence is tremendously cinematic, particularly with the direct transition from Gala in the backseat whispering, "James...there's only you left," to the image of Bond's goggled face behind the wheel "filthy with the blood of flies and moths that had smashed against it." You can almost see the camera pushing in on Bond's scowling, determined face, the wind howling all around him.
Though the scene is reminiscent of the car chase in CR and even ends similarly, the story naturally dictates another car chase and Fleming writes it thrillingly, adding enough new dynamics to prevent it from feeling redundant.
That's actually a pretty awesomely pulpy alternate title for Moonraker.
It's a great line, but it's always annoyed me that Drax has successfully lived a lie for years, then makes an amateur mistake like this. Compare with The 39 Steps, in which the villains act in character at all times, even when nobody could possibly be observing them, making Hannay seriously doubt his suspicions.
As a biker, I am very familiar with this scenario, and with my face being a mask of dirt (a phrase, I now realise, I plagiarise constantly).
Edition I read: 1964 Pan with the nice Raymond Hawkey cover. According to the price scribbled on the flyleaf I paid 30p for it. Certainly got my money’s worth.
Where I read it: I've made an effort to be entertaining with reading locations, and it occurred to me that this was the only Bond I could read in situ, as it were. So I took it down to the Kent coast, of which more at the end.
James Bond
Bond really is Mr Nice Guy in this one. He’s delighted to take on a private job as a favour to his boss, then spends most of the book acting as Gala’s protector and pal (once they get over themselves and their inter-service rivalry). Even his pants are ‘reassuring’.
And at the end, he's the perfect gentleman about Gala's rejection. It feels a bit mean to name this as my favourite Fleming ending - poor old James! - but I love it for its uniqueness and the way it derails the expected finale. Usually, only death can prevent Bond from ending up with the girl. Not this time.
Grabbing someone and forcibly kissing them, though? Not cool, and spoils the otherwise very sweet “hey, let’s go swimming in our underwear!” scene.
I enjoy the look at everyday office life between missions, and the titbit about Bond's involvement with the motorsports scene. Anthony Horowitz took this and ran with for Trigger Mortis.
In the Blades section, Commander Bond is described as ‘cold’, ‘dangerous’ and ‘saturnine’. This passage, perhaps more than any other, goes a long way towards explaining why I so instantly adopted Timothy Dalton as My Bond.
The villain
Thanks to Moonraker, I have never been able to trust Sir Richard Branson. I always wonder why he’s being so generous to Britain and what his endgame is. Offer to buy Concorde and keep it flying, would you? Planning to crash it into Buckingham Palace, are you??
Like Le Chiffre, Drax is a displaced person who has taken advantage of wartime chaos to ditch his real identity. Like every Bond villain, his physical appearance is repugnant, if not medically abnormal. His gradual transformation from unlikeable cheat to full-blown fanatic is horrifying and fascinating.
The girl
Gala Brand is a big part of what makes this my favourite Bond novel. She’s a professional and she’s not going to stand any nonsense from this upstart secret agent. She copes brilliantly with everything that gets thrown at her, most of which is way outside her remit, and she talks Bond out of his noble but suicidal plan for blowing up the Moonraker.
Then she turns him down, in a shock move that, on first reading, wrongfooted me just as much as it does Bond.
It’s also perfectly acceptable that she fools around with 007 despite being engaged; this strikes me as unusual behaviour for a '50s heroine, and pretty darn liberated of Fleming. (I do wonder what she said to her fiancé, who’s hanging around when she says goodbye.)
...If Gala’s even half as beat-up as Bond by the end, it’s not going to look great in the wedding photos, is it? And how does getting married the next afternoon fit with the need to lay low and get out of the country? Still, though: George Cross in the morning, wedding in the afternoon, what a day.
Other cast
Drax has surrounded himself with a sinister bunch of characters:
- Dr Walter, who cares for nothing but scientific data - or, as Tom Lehrer put it in Wernher von Braun: "Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?”
- 'Krebs' means 'crab', but also 'cancer'. A creepy name for a creepy guy.
- Plus a large cast of bald, moustached extras. I would love to see this crew on film.
Back at HQ, we get a rare glimpse into M’s private life (which seems much like Bond’s, but with less sex and slightly better food) and meet Loelia Ponsonby, as well as Moneypenny. I do enjoy Bond’s rare conversations with women he isn’t actively trying to get off with.
Let us also spare a thought for 008. He never appears onscreen but I was quite concerned for him, and glad he got better.
The plot
Starts as an old-fashioned story of etiquette and scandal in clubland which could have come out of the 1920s; turns into a detective yarn; ends up as sci-fi. Overall, a wonderful thriller that ramps up the disbelief so gradually you don't notice how extreme it's all become until suddenly they're trying to blow up London!!!
However, I’ve re-read the last section several times and I really, really don’t understand why they can’t phone somebody after escaping from Krebs’s knots. At the very least, Bond could ring M and suggest that everyone at HQ pops down to the firing-range in the basement at launch time. No, sir, nothing to worry about, leave it to me...but just in case.
I’m also not entirely sure why Gala feels the need to run off and do her face. Maybe she wants to be a pretty corpse.
The location
This is the other reason Moonraker is my favourite Bond novel. There’s something much more immediate and frightening about danger lurking on the English coast than when it’s in the remote Caribbean - just as the scariest Dr Who stories are the ones set on Earth rather than an alien planet.
I also like how geographically tight it all is, with various parts of London, the Kent coast, and the road between them the only locations.
I have become even fonder of the setting in adulthood, since I now live in south London and am often out and about in Kent. I am all too familiar with the South Circular from Clapham Common to the junction with the A20. The ‘crest of Wrotham Hill’ and the ‘moonlit panorama of the Weald of Kent’ are my backyard. Lovely.
There’s some beautiful descriptive writing going on here; I’m going to single out the Daliesque Moonraker base, and any scene that takes place at night, for special praise.
Food & drink
I am simultaneously fascinated and appalled by the marrowbone concept. I think I read recently that it was coming back into fashion. Gross.
By coincidence, I happened to have a bottle of Black & White, which Bond drinks at the World without Want, in my booze cupboard; I got it as part of an online drinks order because I’d had no idea it was still made and I’ve always liked the doggies on the label. So I enjoyed the final chapters over a glass. (It turns out I like it, so given my taste in whisky it’s probably pretty awful.)
Miscellany
On Saturday I hopped on the motorbike and took Bond’s route, roughly, to St Margaret’s at Cliffe, site of Ian Fleming's holiday home and the most likely setting for the novel. I had a lovely ride and a lovely afternoon swimming and reading.
On the way, I stopped for a coffee at the Thomas Wyatt, where Gala inspects the notebook. I’d been once before; I only knew it was a real place because years ago a colleague told me his old local was in a Bond book, knowing I’d get a kick out of that.
It’s a chain pub these days and the picture makes it look nicer than it is, though the outside is pretty.
Some dangerous cliffs. Can confirm that the sea is cold; top marks for observation, 007. It’s quite wet, too.
Nothing fell on me but I did scrape my knee on a rock, so I can claim to have shared in the DREADFUL SUFFERING.
(Nor did I go swimming in my pants. Even I have some limits.)
The ‘accommodating’ Granville Hotel is no more. They built luxury flats on it.
For completists, and enemy spies, here’s the Swingate radar thingy with MOD KEEP OUT notice. Pretty sure it’s OK to post this, as it’s on Google StreetView, but I’m glad nobody came out to ask what I was doing.
Obviously none of you made me go off and spend my Saturday being a massive nerd, but I wouldn’t have done it without this thread, and I had a terrific time. A golden day, if you will. Thank you all!
Good catch, I hadn't noticed that. The name couldn't be more fitting.
I hadn't considered this either. At this point in the book, I think I'm too mesmerized by Bond's self-sacrificing plan to destroy the Moonraker. But you're right, a little head's up to M wouldn't have been out of order. As you say, just in case. Maybe tell May to take some immediate holiday.
Peculiar detail of Krebs enjoying "the spring woods full of bluebells and celandines on the way to Chilham" after they collect Bond from the wreck. Fleming makes him out to be such an odd duck. Things Krebs likes: ogling women and machines, murdering the English, and scenic drives during the springtime.
Lovely transition there, however, to Fleming's official reveal that Krebs and Drax are Germans.
I love how Bond, battered as he is already from the car crash, decides he'll have to throw himself bound out the back of the speeding car and go for help. His body means nothing to him. Any and every part of him is expendable when it comes to completing the mission. That's insane. And awesome.
22. Pandora's Box
Draw appears enraptured by his own hatred for the British: "...we ran through the British Army and France like a knife through butter. Intoxicating." Then he "luxuriously" puffs on his cigar while Bond imagines he's "seeing the burning villages of Belgium in the smoke." Sort of like Krebs and his—err—"relationship" with the machine.
Fleming draws upon his WWII knowledge to really flesh out Drax's background and give the man believable motive for hating England so absolutely.
Poetic justice: Drax in his British uniform being blasted off the road by one of his own planes. Also slightly evocative of how he will finally meet his end.
Another silly contrivance: the German Hugo von der Drache is presented with a missing British identity of Hugo Drax? And that that identity happens to have no known kin? I mean what are the odds? Why couldn't Fleming have made his real German name something else completely? Not a huge deal, but Fleming really stretches suspension of disbelief on that one.
I love how the moment he gets out of the war hospital, Drax goes "round London looking for someone to kill and rob."
Prompted by Bond's jab about the paranoia, Drax unleashes on him, twice having to pick up his chair, further adding to the body damage count. Of course, "Bond gritted his teeth and took it." Not much else he could do. Turns out, in true Bondian fashion, Bond had engineered Drax's rage so as to distract him from the blowtorch. All part of the plan.
23. Zero Minus
Tense sequence with Bond and Gala, chair-tied, trying to use the blowtorch to free their bonds. Bond nearly sears his face off. Thank heavens for those two weeks leave after each mission, eh?
Gala kisses him on the mouth. Out of gratitude. Not sending mixed signals or anything. Learn how to read your kisses, Bond.
Rather morbid bit here where Bond, knowing his plans mean his own death, thinks to himself, "Preparing the corpse!" while showering.
Bond's plan is noble, heroic, fully self-sacrificing. Truly there is nothing more his country could ask of him.
I also love that Bond isn't simply going to light a lighter under the Moonraker, but light his cigarette under the Moonraker. Going out with style.
Maybe this is just part of his gallantry, his brave face for Gala, but Bond admits he has wanted to be a true hero since he was a little boy. There surely is some truth in that, and Bond lives the life that that encompasses, sometimes with its glamor and rewards, more often with all its horror and pain and nastiness.
Flushing Bond and Gala out with the steam hose—another scene that would play great on film.
I like Bond telling Gala to bring her knees up. "This is no time to be maidenly." And her annoyed reply: "Shut up." More shades of Miranda Frost there.
24. Zero
@Agent_99 brought up a good point about Bond not telephoning M about Drax's plan. For that matter, why does Bond do nothing when the Minister of Supply and all the news reporters are right there on the site? Perhaps he could stroll out all bloodied and right there in front of the media explain what's really going on? Because his cover would be exposed? Because Drax might make a run for it and launch the Moonraker right then and there and Bond had a plan that didn't risk Drax's awareness? Both possible explanations, but with the fate of London on the line, the cost seems far too great to pass up an opportunity to expose Drax in front of a crowd like that.
Another hilarious bit of Fleming comedy with Drax's über patriotic, double-meaninged speech about vengeance, blood, and the fatherland, concluding with "I sincerely hope that those of you who are able will repeat my words to your children, if you have any, tonight." The real kicker is the rightfully "rather hesitant applause" from the audience.
Incredible finale as heard via the radio commentator. Even though the scene is being given to us through a voice on the radio, you can see it all clearly: the beautiful day, the crowds, the Russian submarine, the silver Moonraker coming down out of the perfect blue sky and sending up a great tidal wave. Visually makes me think of the shuttle explosion scene in Contact or the alternate ending of The Abyss. Part of me wishes Bond might have had a chance to take Drax down hand-to-hand—something he still hasn't done with the main villain yet—but the climax is terrifically executed all the same.
25. Zero Plus
Excellent summation of just how much Bond has been through: "Bond...across the desk from the quiet man with the cold grey eyes who had invited him to dinner and a game of cards a hundred years ago." I also like the detail of Bond needing a cane to limp about. It's a nice realistic touch. And it humbles and humanizes Bond. Same too with the gloved hand and the way he clumsily holds his cigarette to smoke (an unprecedented privilege M affords him for saving London's bacon).
Clever—but mean—detail from Fleming about the radiation from the atomic blast being carried by the wind toward Germany. To be fair, this was pretty fresh after the war and Germany as a whole was surely still viewed as a great villain by the British. Still mean though and a bit shocking, having Bond smile in satisfaction over the thought of an entire country being plagued by radiation.
Mention of a pigeon nodding its head on the windowsill. No specific mention of a double-take, but you never know...
I do like that it's the same pigeon Bond had seen on Monday, ages ago. It's as if nothing has changed. It's all back to normal. London the same as it ever was. And that's a good thing and all thanks to Bond. But for Bond, much has changed. Some of it having to do with the state of his body; more having to do with Gala.
Gala, very rightfully, is awarded the George Cross. Bond too would have received a medal, but the honor is disallowed in the Service.
A rare smile passes between M and Bond. An honor as good as any medal.
M's gift to Bond: a new Beretta and long-barrel Colt. A reminder that he gets his holiday, but after that, there's work to be done. A bit Skyfall-ish, this presentation of M's gift with Loelia. No coincidence I'm sure.
"What kind of an emergency?"
"Any invitation to a quiet game of bridge."
Ha! Nice.
Bond has it bad for Gala, planning out their trip to France, looking at her as she arrives as if she were "someone unattainable and more desirable than anyone you have ever known."
Such beautiful thoughts peppered throughout this saddest of endings: "He must get out of these two young lives and take his cold heart elsewhere. There must be no regrets. No false sentiment. He must play the part she expected of him."
Still he lets her know his heart, if jestingly: "I had other plans for you tomorrow night."
Gala tells him there are plenty of others, and Bond concedes, "I suppose so." There are plenty of others. But none are Gala. "He touched her for the last time and then they turned away from each other and walked off into their different lives." Heartbreaking. Bond humanized and humbled like never before. Fleming's best. Fortunately we get right on to the adventure, sadism, and palling around again with Leiter in the next one, but for now a most tender and most human moment for Bond.
I also love Bond's moment of attempted self-sacrifice, and the pride and style he would have done it with. It would be nice for the films to include more of those sort of scenes. A little more nobility and idealism can't hurt. Fleming might have intended Bond to be a "blunt instrument" in Casino Royale, but three books into the series Bond had already grown out of that phase.
To my mind the blunt instrument was merrily a good sounding line to Fleming. Actually there isn't much in the books that depicts Bond as a blunt instrument. Even in the very first book he has all this inner turmoil about the worth of this job. Also, cold blooded killing seems to be completely out of his reach. He even gives Scaramanga the first chance just for not getting this too much on conscience. In for you ours only he muses about all the time how much he rejects doing the killing even though he knows that those he is after have just killed an old couple for profit.
Hardly a blunt instrument, if you ask me .
You're very welcome! Glad you liked them!
You can bet there are weirder online dating profiles out there.
When you put it like that, I just want to give him a big hug. Except, of course, he dislikes being cosseted.
Scrambled eggs count: 1
Diamonds is tomorrow...
The first time I read it, I was convinced that the Japanese murder drug would show up again later in the book, and Bond would get in trouble because he hadn't read the dossier properly. I was quite disappointed when this didn't happen.
I was not yet aware of the term 'Chekhov's gun', but I had grasped the principle!
It's also in that part of Moonraker where Fleming has Bond reacting to news of two Double-Os not doing well in the field, with 0011 missing entirely. 008 is also mentioned, and this made me wonder about something that's never really answered...
While speaking to Ponsonby Bond hears that 008 is resting up in Germany, but is experiencing a state of shock, which the spy seems to know the real meaning of. I don’t know what Bond means by this, or what he thinks 008’s “shock” signifies. My only theory is that through his run in with immense death and his awareness of the grim job he is tasked with, 008 may be rethinking his commitment to MI6 just as Bond did after a similar brush with death and trauma in Casino Royale. Because a simple two weeks leave for recoupment seems a far more common standard in the service for agents after a bad job than a more drawn out and ominous sounding period of shock, it doesn’t seem to be too much of a leap to imagine that said agents could be contemplating retirement after a life-altering experience of trauma and horrors.
Or maybe I just read too much into that part of it.
@Thunderfinger, I love that cover.