Blowing hot and cold? - Your views on John Gardner's SeaFire (1994)
Silhouette Man
The last refuge of a scoundrelPosts: 8,845MI6 Agent
I'd really like to hear your collective views here about John Gardner's SeaFire (1994). It features Bond settling down with Flicka von Grusse (from the previous year's Never Send Flowers). The plot is also rather convoluted (Sir Max Tarn wants to become the new Fuhrer of a new Fourth Reich in the newly (1990) reunified Germany (making this plot neo-Nazi plot element rather absurd, even for a Bond novel, IMHO) and create a giant oil spill and clean it up - not sure if I can remember how these two remote plans are related, though, if at all?
SeaFire is controversial for the inclusion of the MicroGlobe One department taking over M's department at SIS (it also features in Cold/Cold Fall) and a lot of readers really disliked this change in the last two books - but change was in the air from the end of Never Send Flowers onwards. It was a plot device to get a mole on the Board (shades of Frederick Forsyth's The Day of the Jackal here?) and is used by Gardner as a plot device to smooth over the transition between the old M and the new female M in the film series. The old M from the Fleming novels was rather put out to grass from SeaFire on (he was ill and in old age) and was replaced by the new female M from the film GoldenEye onwards, although he later reappeared in the new works by Faulks, Deaver and (in 2013) William Boyd. He also reappeared in his retirement at Quarterdeck in The Facts of Death (1998) by Raymond Benson.
I've already written one article on the novel on my The Bondologist Blog:
http://commanderbond...e-in-ww-ii.html
http://thebondologis...defence-of.html
I have ideas for a few other articles on this novel up my sleeve which will appear on my The Bondologist Blog in due course.
In the meantime, I'd really love to hear your views on John Gardner's SeaFire.
I really appreciate all of your views (and reviews), as always!
-{
SeaFire is controversial for the inclusion of the MicroGlobe One department taking over M's department at SIS (it also features in Cold/Cold Fall) and a lot of readers really disliked this change in the last two books - but change was in the air from the end of Never Send Flowers onwards. It was a plot device to get a mole on the Board (shades of Frederick Forsyth's The Day of the Jackal here?) and is used by Gardner as a plot device to smooth over the transition between the old M and the new female M in the film series. The old M from the Fleming novels was rather put out to grass from SeaFire on (he was ill and in old age) and was replaced by the new female M from the film GoldenEye onwards, although he later reappeared in the new works by Faulks, Deaver and (in 2013) William Boyd. He also reappeared in his retirement at Quarterdeck in The Facts of Death (1998) by Raymond Benson.
I've already written one article on the novel on my The Bondologist Blog:
http://commanderbond...e-in-ww-ii.html
http://thebondologis...defence-of.html
I have ideas for a few other articles on this novel up my sleeve which will appear on my The Bondologist Blog in due course.
In the meantime, I'd really love to hear your views on John Gardner's SeaFire.
I really appreciate all of your views (and reviews), as always!
-{ "The tough man of the world. The Secret Agent. The man who was only a silhouette." - Ian Fleming, Moonraker (1955).
Comments
having read my review series, you already know my views!
I'd stress two things:
1. Micro Globe One is a half-hearted attempt to drag 007 into the modern era. Previously Bond was still meeting M in that wood panelled office and was still '007'. He appears to have been promoted and is not enjoying it. This of course is exactly the kind of transition Bond's career ought to take, which is realistic. What isn't of course, is that he's still galavanting around the world doing all the leg work. So who else is in this 'Double Zero' set up? Hands up anyone! The novel doesn't really need this scenario. Explaining it takes time and slows the first quarter to a standstill.
2. The plot is rather convoluted. When you read it you keep thinking it should be easier to fathom, but it isn't. By the very end, you wonder if it was all worth while. Tarn's motive and reward hardly seems worth the effort he puts into it. I also dislike the episodic nature of the book. Bond flies to Spain, does some spying, flies to UK, reports, flies to Germany, does some spying, flies to the UK, reports, etc etc.
My personal bug-bear, and one of my frequent criticisms of Gardner, is that the climax is too swift. It's wrapped up in about three chapters. Gardner seems to consider that a Bond book needs incident after incident to propel it. It doesn't. Fleming's novels often feature very little incident, perhaps only one or two highlights, before the eventual denoument. What Fleming succeeds at is raising the tension and atmosphere, examining the dynamic of the characters and how they fit into the plot, resolving the story with a long fuse and a large explosion. Gardner gives us several short fuses and small explosions. So much so that often the tension has been deflated by the time we finally reach his climax. Seafire is a particularly grating example because the author has basically got all the ingredients right, but he has no idea how to blend them into a memorable recipe.
I'll have to re-read it. I do remember when Bond was clambering about inside the submarine. You could imagine/visualise that.
Bleuville.