What other author(s) can compare?

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

  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    I asked myself the same question forty years ago... :# I tried Len Deighton (wonderful, but not the same), Donald Hamilton (Matt Helm on paper does not equal Dean Martin), John Le Carre (dreadful), and so on. IMHO James Mayo's Charles Hood was a reasonably passable pastiche- try one of his ("Hammerhead" would be my suggestion) and see what you think.
  • Mark HazardMark Hazard West Midlands, UKPosts: 495MI6 Agent
    You could also try one of John Gardner's other characters - the Boysie Oakes series, great fun.
  • chrisno1chrisno1 LondonPosts: 3,176MI6 Agent
    Barbel wrote:
    I asked myself the same question forty years ago... :# I tried Len Deighton (wonderful, but not the same), Donald Hamilton (Matt Helm on paper does not equal Dean Martin), John Le Carre (dreadful), and so on. IMHO James Mayo's Charles Hood was a reasonably passable pastiche- try one of his ("Hammerhead" would be my suggestion) and see what you think.

    Hood is good.
    "Let Sleeping Girls Lie" is my fav.
    Unfortunately these are out of print, but some 2nd hand booksllers have them
  • LoeffelholzLoeffelholz The United States, With LovePosts: 8,988Quartermasters
    Barbel wrote:
    Donald Hamilton (Matt Helm on paper does not equal Dean Martin)

    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.
    Check out my Amazon author page! Mark Loeffelholz
    "I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
    "Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
  • hegottheboothegottheboot USAPosts: 327MI6 Agent
    Nothing compares to Fleming's aim "somewhere between the solar plexus and the upper thigh"...
    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.
  • InfernorhythmInfernorhythm Los AngelesPosts: 88MI6 Agent
    It's a bit more pulpy and less spy-based, but Clive Cussler's Dirk Pitt series has been a very entertaining read.
    "You're both, what's the expression? Damaged goods."
  • Golrush007Golrush007 South AfricaPosts: 3,418Quartermasters
    I have read some of the Len Deighton novels which others have mentioned and would recommend them. They are quite different from the Bond novels, so they might not be the answer if you are looking for something exactly like the Bonds. The IPCRESS File is very good - I love the film version as well. Funeral in Berlin was also fairly good in my opinion. I haven't yet read Horse Under Water and have only read about half of Billion Dollar Brain - which I was enjoying, not sure why I stopped. . . :s
  • paulwoodpaulwood Posts: 11MI6 Agent
    max stich novel - All or Nothing is coming soon bond like spy called julian scott and his missions
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    Hi paulwood, I've deleted your other post re this novel- we don't allow multiple posts.
  • philpogphilpog Posts: 51MI6 Agent
    tomthumb wrote:
    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?

    Yes.

    Peter O'Donnell. I highly recommend reading all of his Modesty Blaise novels.
  • Silhouette ManSilhouette Man The last refuge of a scoundrelPosts: 8,644MI6 Agent
    James Leasor's Dr Jason Love spy series. He was the first author asked to be Fleming's successor as a Bond continuation author.
    "The tough man of the world. The Secret Agent. The man who was only a silhouette." - Ian Fleming, Moonraker (1955).
  • caractacus pottscaractacus potts Orbital communicator, level 10Posts: 3,907MI6 Agent
    philpog wrote:
    Peter O'Donnell. I highly recommend reading all of his Modesty Blaise novels.
    I agree, of all the books mentioned, the Modesty Blaise series comes closest. The other examples that I've read are much drier than Fleming, probably more realistic about how spying is really done, but I like the exotic escapist swashbuckling thriller aspect, and Modesty Blaise is very good for this, and funny too

    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
  • superadosuperado Regent's Park West (CaliforniaPosts: 2,651MI6 Agent
    After reading the Fleming books, try them in audio! For me, they've been like a totally different experience. The Fleming books were my entryway into spy thrillers and the like and I've really liked the authors mentioned already, but I would include Robert Ludlum, whose writings were the pulp in his time just as Fleming's was; the early Ludlum's are very entertaining and I would avoid the latter ones, esp. those written in his name by other authors (he died in 2001).

    EDIT: Didn't realize how old this thread was, lol!
    "...the purposeful slant of his striding figure looked dangerous, as if he was making quickly for something bad that was happening further down the street." -SMERSH on 007 dossier photo, Ch. 6 FRWL.....
  • Sterling ArcherSterling Archer Posts: 197MI6 Agent
    The very reason so many of us love Bond is why so many other readers gravitate towards other books. I think Fleming is sort of in a category of his own.

    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.
  • HachiHeadHachiHead Posts: 5MI6 Agent
    Maybe look into Sherlock Holmes. Doyle approached Holmes much the same way Fleming approached Bond, inserting plenty of contemporary history and politics into more focused stories.
  • RevelatorRevelator Posts: 555MI6 Agent
    tomthumb wrote:
    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?

    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.
  • brintmanbrintman Posts: 19MI6 Agent
    An author of the late 1940's through the 1950's might be the one.Hank Janson was his name,Check the websites.
  • Bond Collectors' WeekendsBond Collectors' Weekends Gainesville, Florida USAPosts: 1,882MI6 Agent
    tomthumb wrote:
    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?

    You read all 14 or all 47?
    Seven (007) James Bond Tours! Mission: Mexico!
  • BodieBodie Posts: 211MI6 Agent
    The Quiller novels by Adam Hall.

    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.
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    Yes, they're very good. and I recommend them too. (The first is technically called "The Berlin Memorandum", btw, it's the film that uses Quiller's name in the title.)
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy Behind you !Posts: 63,792MI6 Agent
    Not really espionage but I have read plenty of
    Stephen king and Clive Cussler, and have enjoyed
    The Nick Carter books. Although these have been
    Written by many writers.
    "I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
  • 007Downunder007Downunder Hobart, Australia Posts: 373MI6 Agent
    Charles McCarry's Paul Christopher novels the best espionage I've read
    Anthony
  • BodieBodie Posts: 211MI6 Agent
    I really enjoyed the Paul Christopher novels. Very well written. Sort of an American Le Carre.
  • 007Downunder007Downunder Hobart, Australia Posts: 373MI6 Agent
    I think he's better than LeCarre. His latest the mulberry bush in the pile to read.im reading Gerald Seymour 's Jericho's war at the moment like all his work not glamorous but good. My favorite spy writer at the moment is Daniel Silva.
    Anthony
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy Behind you !Posts: 63,792MI6 Agent
    Are most modern espionage books, more realistic or are there
    Still some " improbable not impossible " adventures out there ?
    "I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
  • onemonk909onemonk909 Posts: 65MI6 Agent
    If you’re looking for spy/thriller novels written in the same style as Fleming, then you’re going to have a hard time finding something similar…in my opinion, Fleming had a style that was at odds with what one normally expects of the thriller genre. Overly digressive, given to poetic flourishes, sometimes to the detriment of the forward momentum. And yet this is just one of the things that draws so many readers to his work.

    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.
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