Advice on how to read the Fleming Bond Books
perdogg
Posts: 432MI6 Agent
A lot of people have never read the Bond novels and the success of Skyfall have gotten people interested in the books, here is some advice:
1. Read them in order of publication, including the short-stories. Start with Casino Royale and end with The Man with The Golden Gun.
2. Clear your mind of the movies. There are no space based weapon systems, no volcano lairs, no lasers, and no space flights.
3. Understand the era. Bond was born around 1920, most of the Bond women in the novels were born in the 1930s. There are things like 'wire recorders' in the novels that people will not have any idea what they were. If you need to, look them up on the internet.
4. Read them slowly including the "boring parts". Fleming paints a picture. He does not come out and says "the man dropped a grenade in the water", he will describe the action instead. Also, there are many references to gothic literature and mythology in the novels, if you read the books too fast you will miss them. The books were written in a time when people read and did not watch TV.
5. Ignore the continuity mistakes from novel to novel; Fleming was unaware that his novels would be successful and he never wrote fully anticipating he might have to be consistent in future editions.
1. Read them in order of publication, including the short-stories. Start with Casino Royale and end with The Man with The Golden Gun.
2. Clear your mind of the movies. There are no space based weapon systems, no volcano lairs, no lasers, and no space flights.
3. Understand the era. Bond was born around 1920, most of the Bond women in the novels were born in the 1930s. There are things like 'wire recorders' in the novels that people will not have any idea what they were. If you need to, look them up on the internet.
4. Read them slowly including the "boring parts". Fleming paints a picture. He does not come out and says "the man dropped a grenade in the water", he will describe the action instead. Also, there are many references to gothic literature and mythology in the novels, if you read the books too fast you will miss them. The books were written in a time when people read and did not watch TV.
5. Ignore the continuity mistakes from novel to novel; Fleming was unaware that his novels would be successful and he never wrote fully anticipating he might have to be consistent in future editions.
"And if I told you that I'm from the Ministry of Defence?" James Bond - The Property of a Lady
Comments
I have always liked how he built suspense with Bond calculating his next move, and contingency plans. Only film that ever came close to capturing that for me was FRWL.
“It reads better than it lives.” T. Case