JAMES BOND BOOKS #4: DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER

 

My progression through Ian Fleming's James Bond books continues with Diamonds Are Forever, the fourth of the Bond books, published in 1956. 

When I originally read these books more than 50 years ago, I ranked Diamonds Are Forever above all but the most known of the Bond books. With reflection brought by a half-century of reading and experiences, I've changed my view. 

This fourth book in the Bond series is well worth reading. It provides an interesting historical look at American organized crime, mid-century horse racing and the early years of Las Vegas. But the story comes up a little short in the Bond genre, and I rank it as the weakest of the first four Bond books. In fact, excluding The Spy Who Loved Me, it may bemy least favorite of all the Bond novels.

The story is a tale of diamond smuggling from South Africa, through England, New York City, the race track at Saratoga, and on to Las Vegas. The shortcoming is that this is more of a police story about catching smugglers than a spy thriller. It seems a bit inconsequential for a 00 agent like Bond. 

As with most of the Bond book-to-film conversions, the 1971 movie does not resemble the movie in the most essential parts of the plot. However, there are some interesting aspects of the book that were appropriated by the moviemakers.

 In the opening scene in the movie, a dentist removes diamonds smuggled by mine workers. It comes almost directly from the opening scene in Fleming's book. Perhaps most surprisingly, the gay assassination team of Kidd and Wentz also comes directly from Fleming's novel. So, too, does the quirkily-named Tiffany Case, who is a much more complex femme fatale in the book than the character played by Jill St. John in the movie. There is character named Shady Tree in the book, but he's not the comedian who appears in the movie. There is no Willard White and Ernst Stavro Blofeld doesn't appear in the book. He is not introduced until Thunderball, which is much later in the Bond series.

A side note about the genesis of the book. Ian Fleming was the foreign editor of the London Sunday Times. He researched the diamond trade and diamond smuggling for a series of articles published in the London Sunday Times, which gave rise to the plot of Diamonds Are Forever. The articles were later collected and published in one of Fleming's two non-fiction books, The Diamond Smugglers, published in 1957.

This book is still well worth reading and a MUST for any true Bond fan.

JAMES BOND BOOK #3: MOONRAKER

 

Ian Fleming's third James Bond book (1955) was the only one of Fleming's 14 Bond books set entirely in England. It shows Fleming continuing to hone his craft as one of the finest thriller writers of the mid-Twentieth Century. I last read this book in high school more than 50 years ago. It was a joy to re-read it now. 

Hugo Drax is a post-WWII hero. Found severely wounded and with amnesia in the rubble of WWII, he has built a fortune and now is giving back to England by building Moonraker, the world's most advanced rocket that will protect the motherland. Only this multi-millionaire hero has a flaw -- he cheats at cards. 

At M's encouragement, Bond accompanies his boss to Blades, a posh fictitious private card club based on Fleming's own private club. The battle of bridge between Bond and Drax is even more intense and suspenseful than the duel between Bond and LeChiffe in Casino Royale, and is Fleming's writing at its best. But that is only the beginning.

When the security officer at the Moonraker sight is murdered, Bond is sent in his place. And the story kicks into high gear.

It is a well-written book that carries with it more than a bit of mid-century history. It brings back the time when the world was still trembling at the thought of nuclear weapons raining down from the sky on supersonic missiles fired from over the far horizon. Fleming latches on to that fear. Still years before the public started hearing terms like pitch and yaw, Fleming does a very credible job of writing about rocket technology of the time. 

Two final points.  First, Fleming's Moonraker bears no resemblance to the absolutely dreadful Roger Moore movie of the same name. Second, this is the rare book in which Bond doesn't walk off into the sunset with the girl, in this case, Gala Brand. Instead, on the last page, she walks off with her fiance, leaving Bond on his own.

If you enjoy thrillers or books set in the first decade following WWII, this is a MUST READ.

JAMES BOND BOOKS #2: LIVE AND LET DIE

 Live and Let Die is the second book in Ian Fleming's iconic James Bond series. For those who know Bond only through the movies, there is some similarity in the movie to this book, but it is mostly limited to a few characters and settings (Mr. Big, Solitaire, Harlem and the Caribbean.)

Live and Let Die features Bond up against Russian spy service SMERSH  and its "negro" agent Mr. Big. Bond's love interest is the mystical Solitaire. Bond, with the help of CIA agent Felix Leiter, is tracking down Mr. Big's use of Captain Henry Morgan's buried treasure to help communist efforts in the United States. 

It sounds a bit far-fetched, but the plot really works. And the danger of Mr. Big is brought home when one of the major characters suffers catastrophic injuries.

Reading Live and Let Die is like stepping into a time capsule, transporting the reader to the early 1950s, when most travel was by train and places like Harlem, St. Petersburg, FL and Jamaica were exotic places most readers would never visit.

If you're reading the original book, the references to black characters are dated and will cause modern day readers to cringe a bit, (mostly "negros," but I don't think the N-word is ever used).  However the book reflects the reality of perceptions of the time, and is a good history reminder. NOTE; if you're reading the 2023 70th Anniversary release of the Bond novels, they have been re-edited to change some references and language that is now considered offensive. This particularly applies to Live and Let Die.

This is the book where Fleming really begins to his Bond formula. It's a quality thriller that hurtles along at break-neck speed until its dramatic conclusion. Unlike Casino Royale, Bond does not spend time in self-introspection. Nor does the climactic scene come two-thirds of the way through the book. 

The book is noteworthy for being the first of several Bond books and short stories set in the Caribbean, which Fleming loved. He wrote each of the Bond books at his Goldeneye home on the north shore of Jamaica where he vacationed for two months each winter. 

If you keep in mind the time in which this book was written, it is well-worth reading.

JAMES BOND BOOKS: IN THE BEGINNING --- CASINO ROYALE -- Book 1

 

James Bond played a major part in my life. As a middle-school age boy, I saw Goldfinger when it first came out in early 1965.  That summer, I caught up with the series by seeing a double feature of Dr. No and From Russia With Love.  I was hooked!  

By the time Thunderball was heading to theaters, I started reading the Bond books. I read all of them over the next few months -- my first true grown-up books.  I was also hooked on the music, teaching myself to play piano so I could play the Bond music. Two years later, I re-read all the Bond books in order (by that time, The Man With the Golden Gun had been published in paperback.

I have Bond to thank for my interest in writing, reading and music beyond what played on pop radio station.  So last summer I decided to re-visit all of the Bond books, reading them in order. I've started the last of the Bond novels, so I decided to share my thoughts on each of the books with the reviews I wrote on Goodreads upon finishing each one.

So here they are:

Stephen Terrell's Reviews > Casino Royale

Casino Royale (James Bond, #1)
by 

Ian Fleming

Stephen Terrell's review

Oct 20, 2012  ·  edit

it was amazing

bookshelves: favorite-books-ever

"The smell and sweat and smoke of a casino are nauseating at 3 in the morning." So is the very first line of the very first James Bond book, published in 1953.  Seventy years later, it still holds up.

Just re-read for fourth time as part of my re-reading the entire series of Bond books written by Ian Fleming, which have played such an important part in my life. If I remember correctly, it is the first book I have ever read four times. I last read the book in 2012, reading it for the first time in nearly 40 years. I first read it at age 13 when I was making my way through the Bond books in non-sequential order. Two years later, I re-read all 13 books in order.

Casino Royale is an excellent thriller, as the reviews of the time that I looked up stated. Forget the slick gadgets, super-villains and wise cracks -- Casino Royale is a cold-war hard-edged thriller filled with men, like Bond, Felix Leiter, Mathis, Bill Tanner, M - and their creator Ian Fleming - who were hardened and shaped by their experiences in World War II.

Remarkably, the Casino Royale movie with Daniel Craig essentially is the same as the book, just updated. LeChiffe is a money-man for the bad guys (in the book, it's the Russians). He has squandered money that isn't his, and must earn it back in a card game. In the book, it is bacarrate, not Texas hold 'em. But the tension is every bit as powerful in the book, if not more so. 

In the book as well as the film, Vesper Lynd remains one of the most intriguing of all the Bond women. In some ways, her impact on Bond is far greater than any other female character, perhaps even more so than Tracy, Bond's short-lived wife.

I think Ian Fleming would have approved of the Daniel Craig version of Bond in the 2006 version of Casino Royale, much more so than any of the other Bond movies since Thunderball.

Seventy years after it first made its way to bookstores, Casino Royale is still a riveting thriller. If you have not read Casino Royale, you owe it to yourself to do so.