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Which Bond novel are you currently reading?

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  • thelordflasheartthelordflasheart
    Posts: 1,370
    I finished re-reading all the Flemings (in order) over the last year or so. I just finished Colonel Sun which was far better than I remembered - I think reading it as part of the "canon" made me appreciate it more than when I read it without that context. I first read it a few years back when I hadn't read the Fleming books for years; now I see what a good job Amis did in recreating Fleming's world. Not a slavish copy or a pastiche but good enough that it fits in well with Fleming.

    I'll read Licence Renewed next which I only read once when I was very young. I'm curious to see how it compare to Fleming and Amis.

    I'll start a thread at some point to discuss how different it was to read Fleming as an adult Bond's age and not as a teenager. There are some good points and some bad - the good books are far better than I remember them but what a huge drop in quality as the series goes on. But despite that I still found them very "readable".

  • fjdinardofjdinardo
    Posts: 1,970
    I have read Casino Royale, Thunderball, and On Her Majestys Secret Service. Now im gonna start reading You Only Live Twice once it comes in.
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    I'm really enjoying "Carte Blanche." Thought I'd take a break from Fleming (eight read, six to go) and CB was the only book available in the library.
  • SandySandy Somewhere in Europe
    Posts: 4,012
    So, I'm rebuilding my Fleming library with editions in english. I read most of the books in portuguese (some were very bad translations) and the only one that was in english was The Man With the Golden Gun when I was 15 or something.

    I read From a View to a Kill last night, I don't think I had read it before (or at least I didn't remember anything) although I think I read most short stories.

    I Loved It!!! Simple and effective story, stylishly written (as always). Lovely female character, Mary Ann Russell (unusually normal name), strong, corageous, intelligent, beautiful and resourceful. A very ridiculous pickup line, much in the style of the stationary one from QoS.

    One thing striked me (or surprised me perhaps), the enigmatic reference to Bond's childhood: "Pernod is possible, but it should be drunk in company, and anyway Bond had never liked the stuff because its liquorice taste reminded him of his childhood".
    No wonder he stops at the word association with Skyfall. The mere fact that the taste of this drink reminds him of his childhood keeps him from drinking it!
  • SaintMarkSaintMark
    edited May 2012 Posts: 7,653
    Just finished Seafire, which was a decent enough book to read during a traintrip. The book itself showed the natural evolution of James Bond as written by John Gardner. No longer a 00 at the call of M but the head of a brandnew 00 section himself.

    The main villain would do a Indiana Jones movie proud (part 1-3 that is) and is nothing special at all. The adventure is a much shorter tale in content than JG actually wrote, a lot of filler material.

    5/10
  • SandySandy Somewhere in Europe
    Posts: 4,012
    Yesterday was the turn of The Living Daylights, still one of my favourites ever. It's funny how time changes our memory of stories. Somehow stuff from the film mixed up with the book in my head but other things were as fresh as the first time I read it, about 10 years ago. Highly recommended short story.

    I had bought The Living Daylighs and From a View to a Kill online, and there was no information that this TLD also had AVTAK, so I bought it twice. Funny thing is the two AVTAK are not completely identical! Very weird, some phrases are missing from one of the editions.
  • SaintMarkSaintMark
    Posts: 7,653
    Christopher Wood's The spy who loved me.

    Still a big mystery whu they have not asked this gentleman for a go at an original tale of 007. His two novelisations are bloody brilliant.
  • BounineBounine
    Posts: 2,599
    I'm about to start Wood's TSWLM soon. I've read his Moonraker novelisation which is good but not up there with TSWLM I've heard. I've actually had the book for over two years now but I've heard that it's so good and almost up there with the Fleming books that I've put off reading it in order to savour the excitement.

    "Still a big mystery whu they have not asked this gentleman for a go at an original tale of 007. His two novelisations are bloody brilliant."

    Unfortunately, I think IFP have lowered themselves to merely asking big name authors who are currently in the spotlight.
  • SaintMarkSaintMark
    Posts: 7,653
    Well the gentlemen in question are pretty good writers but they have failed more or less to really go for the real deal. Or the books have been written by commitee. :-?

    It has been my fear that the choice would be for the general audience instead of going for the market that generally buy spy novels. That would explain the recent Bondnovels that are more the movie Bond instead of the Fleming Bond.
    That said with Higson they did the right thing instead of going bloody commercial and that worked out well enough commercially.
  • GoalieJim31GoalieJim31
    Posts: 10
    Currently reading (and enjoying) Zero Minus Ten by Mr. Benson. Still reading in publication order (except for Devil May Care, which was read during the Fleming stage).

    Never realized that a multi-player game of mahjong was so involved. Actually makes baccarat's rules seem easier to remember. But to master both would still be difficult.
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    Finished Carte Blanche yesterday. Entertaining, but I prefer the original Bond. Just started Gardner's "Nobody Lives Forever." So far pretty good.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    DB5 wrote:
    Finished Carte Blanche yesterday. Entertaining, but I prefer the original Bond. Just started Gardner's "Nobody Lives Forever." So far pretty good.
    Did you feel like "Bond" in Carte Blanche could be interchanged with any other spy and it still would have worked as a novel?
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. It was certainly a fun read, although Deaver's habit of creating a "crisis" at the end of each very short chapter, only to reveal that it wasn't that way at all, tended to get a bit tiresome toward the end. But I never believed that the protagonist was the same James Bond as the guy who beat Le Chiffre at baccarat or who killed the giant squid at Crab Key. I've made it through the first three chapters of NLF, so far I like Gardner's take on the character much more than Deaver's.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    DB5 wrote:
    Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. It was certainly a fun read, although Deaver's habit of creating a "crisis" at the end of each very short chapter, only to reveal that it wasn't that way at all, tended to get a bit tiresome toward the end. But I never believed that the protagonist was the same James Bond as the guy who beat Le Chiffre at baccarat or who killed the giant squid at Crab Key. I've made it through the first three chapters of NLF, so far I like Gardner's take on the character much more than Deaver's.

    Deaver's effort just wasn't "Bond". The way he walked, talked, acted wasn't all Bond. Like how he respected Ophelia by not sleeping with her after she told him she and the ex were going to try over again. The real Bond would sleep with her, and not respect her for her choice there.
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    And also after he sleeps with Felicity Willing he has to convince himself that he hasn't "cheated" on Ophelia. When did Fleming's Bond ever have such thoughts? Never, that's when! My main problem with CB though us that there are just too many plots going on, so many that I can't keep them all straight. If you were to ask me to tell you the plot of CB I'd have a difficult time. Compare that with any of the Fleming novels. Well there is no comparison. I'd probably recommend re-reading a Fleming novel for the second or even third time before reading CB!
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    And also after he sleeps with Felicity Willing he has to convince himself that he hasn't "cheated" on Ophelia. When did Fleming's Bond ever have such thoughts? Never, that's when! My main problem with CB though us that there are just too many plots going on, so many that I can't keep them all straight. If you were to ask me to tell you the plot of CB I'd have a difficult time. Compare that with any of the Fleming novels. Well there is no comparison. I'd probably recommend re-reading a Fleming novel for the second or even third time before reading CB!
  • BounineBounine
    Posts: 2,599
    0BradyM0Bondfanatic7 wrote:
    DB5 wrote:
    Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. It was certainly a fun read, although Deaver's habit of creating a "crisis" at the end of each very short chapter, only to reveal that it wasn't that way at all, tended to get a bit tiresome toward the end. But I never believed that the protagonist was the same James Bond as the guy who beat Le Chiffre at baccarat or who killed the giant squid at Crab Key. I've made it through the first three chapters of NLF, so far I like Gardner's take on the character much more than Deaver's.

    Deaver's effort just wasn't "Bond". The way he walked, talked, acted wasn't all Bond. Like how he respected Ophelia by not sleeping with her after she told him she and the ex were going to try over again. The real Bond would sleep with her, and not respect her for her choice there.

    Very true regarding Deaver's take on the character of Bond. Deaver made a huge, no, gigantic mistake here. He almost completely changed the character. He told me he wanted James Bond to be "liked". Unbelievable.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    Bounine wrote:
    0BradyM0Bondfanatic7 wrote:
    DB5 wrote:
    Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. It was certainly a fun read, although Deaver's habit of creating a "crisis" at the end of each very short chapter, only to reveal that it wasn't that way at all, tended to get a bit tiresome toward the end. But I never believed that the protagonist was the same James Bond as the guy who beat Le Chiffre at baccarat or who killed the giant squid at Crab Key. I've made it through the first three chapters of NLF, so far I like Gardner's take on the character much more than Deaver's.

    Deaver's effort just wasn't "Bond". The way he walked, talked, acted wasn't all Bond. Like how he respected Ophelia by not sleeping with her after she told him she and the ex were going to try over again. The real Bond would sleep with her, and not respect her for her choice there.

    Very true regarding Deaver's take on the character of Bond. Deaver made a huge, no, gigantic mistake here. He almost completely changed the character. He told me he wanted James Bond to be "liked". Unbelievable.

    HE told you? When?!
  • BounineBounine
    edited June 2012 Posts: 2,599
    At his talk and book signing last year while he was signing my book. I had mentioned something about Bond's chauvinism and this was when he said to me that he wanted him to be liked. Pretty much sums up why Bond is so different in CB. I found the book itself relatively enjoyable but it wasn't Bond we read about. Infact, I think I will stop calling Deaver's protagonist in CB, "Bond" from this moment on.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    Bounine wrote:
    At his talk and book signing last year while he was signing my book. I had mentioned something about Bond's chauvinism and this was when he said to me that he wanted him to be liked. Pretty much sums up why Bond is so different in CB. I found the book itself relatively enjoyable but it wasn't Bond we read about. Infact, I think I will stop calling Deaver's protagonist in CB, "Bond" from this moment on.

    You should have slapped him across the face, shouting "FLEMING, FLEMING, FLEMING" as you are taken from the signing by police.
  • echoecho 007 in New York
    Posts: 6,306
    0BradyM0Bondfanatic7 wrote:
    Bounine wrote:
    At his talk and book signing last year while he was signing my book. I had mentioned something about Bond's chauvinism and this was when he said to me that he wanted him to be liked. Pretty much sums up why Bond is so different in CB. I found the book itself relatively enjoyable but it wasn't Bond we read about. Infact, I think I will stop calling Deaver's protagonist in CB, "Bond" from this moment on.

    You should have slapped him across the face, shouting "FLEMING, FLEMING, FLEMING" as you are taken from the signing by police.

    LOL. Post of the day.
  • BounineBounine
    Posts: 2,599
    0BradyM0Bondfanatic7 wrote:
    Bounine wrote:
    At his talk and book signing last year while he was signing my book. I had mentioned something about Bond's chauvinism and this was when he said to me that he wanted him to be liked. Pretty much sums up why Bond is so different in CB. I found the book itself relatively enjoyable but it wasn't Bond we read about. Infact, I think I will stop calling Deaver's protagonist in CB, "Bond" from this moment on.

    You should have slapped him across the face, shouting "FLEMING, FLEMING, FLEMING" as you are taken from the signing by police.

    LOL. I should have, yes. I love playing the obsessed maniac! :)

  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    Just finished "Nobody Lives Forever." Piece of crap. Going back to Fleming, "For Your Eyes Only."
  • Lancaster007Lancaster007 Shrublands Health Clinic, England
    Posts: 1,874
    DB5 wrote:
    Just finished "Nobody Lives Forever." Piece of crap. Going back to Fleming, "For Your Eyes Only."

    I only read the first two Gardner novels - not impressed by either, didn't bother with any of the rest. Just getting to the end of Moonraker.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    I just finished the glorious The Hound of the Baskervilles, and was going to get back onto Bond. I thought of rereading Devil May Care, to see if my opinion on it can finally be made now that I have read the Fleming novels. Should I read it, or go back to Fleming??
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    Finished "From a View to a Kill" yesterday afternoon. Good story, I was thinking how interesting this would be if it was used in a movie. Reading "For Your Eyes Only" (the short story) next.
  • KronsteenKronsteen Stockholm
    Posts: 783
    Read Win, Lose or Die over that past week. A little bit worse than I remembered it, but still a very good read. Probably one of the better continuation novels and in some ways the perfect "modern" Bond novel. While Carte Blanche was a real let-down trying to be a modern Bond, this one worked really well. The idea of getting Bond back in the navy is great and having the story placed on a ship for a long time works very well. Most of the book is pure Bond in my eyes but with a quite unusal story. It feels like Gardner really wanted to do something new and different but keeping the traditional spririt - and I think he pulls it off. The only part I felt was dragging was in Italy, Bond just sitting in that villa over Christmas and falling in love. Quite dull and not really "my kind of Bond".
    I like the villains and the girls though, maybe some of Gardners best, and also the locations are good and wisely used. And the title is excellent as well, but I guess it wasn't Gardners own...
  • BounineBounine
    Posts: 2,599
    Yeah, Win Lose or Die aint a bad book. I think the climax when Bond goes back to the ship is a bit short though.
  • KronsteenKronsteen Stockholm
    Posts: 783
    Bounine wrote:
    Yeah, Win Lose or Die aint a bad book. I think the climax when Bond goes back to the ship is a bit short though.

    I thought that part was good, but the one where Bond and Beatrice is looking for Bassam in Gibraltar could've been a bit longer. Felt a little rushed.

  • BondWillReturnBondWillReturn
    edited June 2012 Posts: 816
    I've just read 2 of Fleming's Bond's on my holiday in Portugal: On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Moonraker. For both it was the first time i'd read them. I've read some of the Fleming books (TMWTGG, TB, LALD) when I was younger, and enjoyed them. But I as too young then to fully understand Fleming's genius.

    I'm 18 now, and I feel I'm starting to truly understand what Fleming created with the novels (very diffrent from the movies IMO). And so I hugely enjoyed both the novels. I think I liked OHMSS the best.

    So now that I'm back home, I've started reading Diamonds Are Forever. Not far enough into it to have an opinion yet. Feel very free to share your opinion of it.
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