What other author(s) can compare?
tomthumb
Posts: 1MI6 Agent
I just finished reading all of the James Bond novels. Now I feel that I've lost a best friend. Can anybody suggest another author I might like?
Comments
Hood is good.
"Let Sleeping Girls Lie" is my fav.
Unfortunately these are out of print, but some 2nd hand booksllers have them
Quite right...the books are one helluva lot better. I highly recommend Death of a Citizen, by Donald Hamilton, and then reading the rest of the Matt Helms in order.
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
Deighton-the "Harry Palmer" novels if you can get through them.
LeCarre-The Spy Who Came in From the Cold
Forsyth-Day of the Jackal, The Odessa File
Ludlum-the Bourne series (much better than the films)
I can mainly point you in the direction of his literary inspiration, Raymond Chandler. Also James M. Cain and Dashiell Hammett.
Yes.
Peter O'Donnell. I highly recommend reading all of his Modesty Blaise novels.
also: John Buchan The Thirty Nine Steps
decades earlier than Fleming, but I think where a lot of the whole spy-novel-as-romantic-adventure thing came from
Buchan wrote four sequels, so this too is a series
EDIT: Didn't realize how old this thread was, lol!
I eventually want to read Le Carre's books but I had to put down his first novel after reading the prologue. I had watched The Night Manager and expected something like that but Smedley is the anti-bond.
The next best thing to reading Fleming is reading the authors who influenced Fleming: Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Sax Rohmer, E. Phillips Oppenheim, Dennis Wheatley, Somerset Maugham, and Eric Ambler.
You read all 14 or all 47?
British agent working for a department called The Bureau which doesn't officially exist. Similar to Bond in that he is sent on the most dangerous missions to different parts of the world. Different to Bond in that Quiller doesn't carry a gun but is an expert in unarmed combat. Much more of a loner than Bond in that he doesn't have a friend like Felix or Mathis.
Don't have to read them in order but is probably better if you do. The first one is called The Quiller Memorandum.
Stephen king and Clive Cussler, and have enjoyed
The Nick Carter books. Although these have been
Written by many writers.
Still some " improbable not impossible " adventures out there ?
However, if you’re looking for something in the spirit of Fleming’s 007, in particular something published in the ‘60s, then there’s a plethora of stuff!
As mentioned upthread, there’s the Nick Carter: Killmaster series. This one ran from ’64 to ’90, and a host of ghostwriters served on it, but the installments from the ‘60s (in my opinion) were the best. Those ones are very much in the 007 mold, plus they’re written in third-person, which I prefer when it comes to thrillers (the series went to first-person in the ‘70s, and stayed that way till the mid ‘80s). I’ve reviewed a bunch of these Killmaster novels at my blog, Glorious Trash, if you are interested:
https://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/search/label/Nick%20Carter%3A%20Killmaster
Of those ‘60s ghostwriters who served on the series, I think the one who came closest to matching Fleming in style would be Manning Lee Stokes…here’s a direct link to all the reviews I’ve done of his work, but bear in mind the guy was very prolific, so at the below link you’ll find reviews of more series novels he worked on than just the Nick Carter ones:
http://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/search/label/Manning%20Lee%20Stokes
But just to focus on one of Stokes’s Killmasters in particular, I’d like to point out Spy Castle, from 1966. This one you might find interesting, as Nick Carter (sort of) meets a British agent (“James Stockes”) who is quite clearly intended to be Bond himself…! Here’s my review of it:
http://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/2017/03/spy-castle-aka-nick-carter-killmaster-12.html
I know this is the last place I should admit this, but I actually prefer the Killmaster books to Flemings Bonds, mostly because they’re so crazy, and more in the manner of the Bond films. In particular I have to call out The Sea Trap, which is not only outrageous in all regards but just one of the best pulp novels I’ve ever had the pleasure to read. This one was by another hardworking ghostwriter, Jon Messmann. Here’s my review:
http://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-sea-trap-aka-nick-carter-killmaster.html
However, ff you’re looking more for something that was the product of one writer and thus one vision (a la Fleming and his original Bond novels), then you might want to check out the Mark Hood series, courtesy Australian author J.E. MacDonnell; they were published in America under the pseudonym James Dark. Hood is an American, went to Oxford, and who now serves as a secret agent for Intertrust, which is dedicated to maintaining the global balance of nuclear power. The series ran from ’65 to ’70 and amounted to 14 volumes, though only 12 were published in the US. I’ve reviewed the first seven volumes at my blog, as well:
http://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/search/label/Mark%20Hood
I like these ones a lot, but bear in mind they are more pulp than Fleming’s novels – or at least, the series becomes more pulpy as it goes on. The first couple installments seem to intentionally strive close to the vibe of Fleming’s material.
Actually, I was wrong above, when I said none of these followers wrote like Fleming – I forgot about Adam Diment, who, despite being hyped as a younger, hipper Fleming, wrote in a style I think was very close to Fleming’s own. He did four novels between ’67 and ’71 about a young, “hash-loving” spy named Philip McAlpine. Despite all the hype, the character comes off like a younger, more boring version of James Bond. Plus the series was written in first-person, which automatically results in a demerit in my book. In case you have detected a theme – yes, I have reviewed a few of these books as well, though only the first two so far (I read the first volume seven years ago, forgot all about the series, and just remembered I needed to keep reading it!):
https://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/search/label/Adam%20Diment
And because I just can’t stop myself, there was also a 4-volume paperback series, running between 1965 and 1966, about a spy who was a master of disguise named Joaquin Hawks. It was written by pulp vet Bill S. Ballinger. These books also strive for the realism and sense of place that Fleming effortlessly displays in his Bond novels. Here are reviews of the first two volumes, in case you are interested:
https://glorioustrash.blogspot.com/search/label/Joaquin%20Hawks
I’d say any of these guys are more so “Fleming’s successors” than the Bond continuation authors of the modern day, if for no other reason than that they were publishing in Fleming’s era, and thus were not bound by the PC-revisionist rules which hamstring today’s authors. But it would appear that some of these modern Bond authors are self-hamstrung; re Anthony Horowitz intentionally trying to undo the “unpleasant” notion that Pussy Galore was only looking for “a realy man” all along, not to mention Horowitz having Bond ridiculed by an openly-gay secret agent (in a novel set in the ‘50s!!) You won’t find anything like that in any of the above books…and you certainly won’t find it in Fleming, either.