Serial Killer Novels and Films - the best of the genre?
Silhouette Man
The last refuge of a scoundrelPosts: 8,828MI6 Agent
The serial killer genre was a craze from the 1970s, 1980s to the mid-1990s and made a comeback in the 2000s and 2010s. The James Bond continuation novel Never Send Flowers by John Gardner was a part of this, hence this thread.
Please use it to make recommendations on serial killer genre novels and serial killer films that are worth tracking down - also please use it for making recommendations about serial killer novels.
Also, what are your thoughts on Never Send Flowers- is it really representative of the serial novels or of the whole serial killer novels genre itself?
What are your thoughts of James Bond going up against a crazed serial killer in the New World Order of the post-Cold War world of the mid-1990s?
Was Gardner flagging by this stage and so he had to look to different genres to keep his Captain James Bond relevant in the modern world?
This was the criticism made by Kirkus Reviews - that James Bond (the literary version at least) was becoming increasingly anachronistic in the post-Cold War world, hence Gardner's change of tack here.
Please use it to make recommendations on serial killer genre novels and serial killer films that are worth tracking down - also please use it for making recommendations about serial killer novels.
Also, what are your thoughts on Never Send Flowers- is it really representative of the serial novels or of the whole serial killer novels genre itself?
What are your thoughts of James Bond going up against a crazed serial killer in the New World Order of the post-Cold War world of the mid-1990s?
Was Gardner flagging by this stage and so he had to look to different genres to keep his Captain James Bond relevant in the modern world?
This was the criticism made by Kirkus Reviews - that James Bond (the literary version at least) was becoming increasingly anachronistic in the post-Cold War world, hence Gardner's change of tack here.
"The tough man of the world. The Secret Agent. The man who was only a silhouette." - Ian Fleming, Moonraker (1955).
Comments
I think you have that right....he was messing about with what he thought he could get away with....wasn't Dragonpol a magician too...?...I remember he had anamatronic figures (a la Scaramanga in the film)....and Gardner was a member of the Magic Circle....again I thought it 'lazy writing'...
I love reading, especially serial killer psychological style books, but I'm confused by your intro to the thread (and perhaps why people haven't responded ?:) )
My books have nothing to do with James Bond, or any authors who have written a James bond novel, and my novels are v.recent, not in time frame you mention...so not sure I'm even responding in the way you're wanting to discuss?
Anyway, the serial killer novels I enjoy are Jo Nesbo...and his Harry Hole thrillers, as well as Karin Slaughter....and her Will Trent series....
I've edited the first post in this thread. Sorry if you were confused by what I had written there, but I hope that I've clarified it now. It wasn't one of my most lucid pieces of writing, natch.
I'm currently writing a lenghty monograph on NSF and its place in the literary James Bond canon, with reference back to the original Bond novels by Ian Fleming. It will appear on my The Bondologist Blog (http://www.thebondologistblog.blogspot.co.uk/) on 15 July 2013 - the 20th Anniversary of the publication of NSF.
All comments and recommendations are much appreciated by this blog author - they are all grist to the mill and, as such, they are very much appreciated indeed.
No, David Dragonpol was an ex-actor stage and screen actor, retired in 1990 after a long and famous career after a nervous breakdown. He then turned his hand to serial killing around the globe. There are, as you note, shades of TMWTGG's fun palace and the whole mano-a-mano element is also straight from that film, Sir Miles.
Yes...but did he not dabble with magic..?...or was that another Gardner character...?...
No, although he was a theatre buff and had a theatrical museum built into his Schloss Drache castle on the Rhinelamnd in Germany - it had many 'magical illusion' of anemetronics, rather like (ironically, given the novel's climax at Euro Disney) the Disney Imagineers would have thought up. Also, a late chapter in NSF was called 'Death Among the Magic' - maybe this is what you were thinking of, Sir Miles?
The novel that really featured magic amongst Gardner's non-Bond oeuvre was Confessor (1995), a Herbie Kruger novel, although many of his novels had a magical element to their plots of course. Maybe you're thinking of this novel, Sir Miles? Having said that, I think that NSF represents the most magically-themed of jhis James Bond works - the many references to Disneyland, the Euro Disney finale, the theatre museum, the ex-actor, the many disguises used by a serial killer around the globe etc. all recall Gardner's diverse interests: criminology, serial killers in general, amateur magicianing, Disney, illusion, myastery, police procedurasl, horror elements etc. It's James Bond meets John Gardner.
I'm currently writing a sort of a monograph on NSF - I'm very interested in the controversial aspects of the Continuation James Bond Novels 1968-2013. It's a research interest of mine.
Maybe that is what I was thinking...I knew he had the animatronics going on...just thought there was a bigger element to the 'magic' side...
Rather than focusing on Bunting himself, the film is more about how he manipulates and exploits a vunerable teenager and other lost souls in a deprived community, making them increasingly complicit in his gruesome crimes.
It's a disturbing and depressing story, but a highly impressive piece of film making.
Thanks for your recommendation, Kissy. True crime meets the serial killer genre sounds most interesting. I will have to try and track that one down. I recently went on a mad spending spree and bought a large number of serial killer/horror films - all grist to the mill for my NSF blog monograph!
All further replies on this topic are much appreciated, as always.