Faulks has taken the sensible decision to set the book in the late 1960s, a few years after the events described in The Man with the Golden Gun. Devil May Care thus becomes a period piece which draws on all of the most successful elements in the Bond canon. At times, it’s as if you can see Faulks mentally ticking off a checklist of Bond tropes. The villain, for example, not only sports a bizarre physical deformity, but also cheats at games and invites Bond to his desert hideaway, where he helpfully explains the novel’s preposterous plot so that 007 can save the day. Miss Moneypenny makes an appearance, as does Felix Leiter, a leg and arm now missing following an unfortunate incident with a hammerhead shark in Thunderball. There’s also a marvellous description of M, ‘the old sailor, peering briefly out of the window, as though somewhere over Regent’s Park there might be enemy shipping’.
And then there’s Bond himself. Faulks has dutifully given his hero the celebrated ‘comma of black hair’ over the forehead and his dark eyes retain their ‘cold, slightly cruel sense of purpose’. The Bond of Devil May Care is also every inch the man of good taste and refined living. When he spots a character emerging from an open-topped car in Marseilles, he is immediately able to deduce that his ‘beige tropical suit’ was cut by Airey and Wheeler of Savile Row. I’m not sure that Faulks quite captures 007’s self-doubt and reluctance to act, but when the author tells you that Bond ‘could never feel enthusiastic about croissants’, you know that you’re in good hands.
The set-pieces are also first class. There’s a tennis match between Bond and his nemesis, Dr Julian Gorner, which is every bit as good as the celebrated round of golf in Goldfinger. No slouch when it comes to action sequences, Faulks puts together several gripping pursuits, the best of which is probably the short, sharp exchange between Bond’s Bentley and a motorbike on the outskirts of London. Bond fans also demand a healthy dose of violence and sadism and, again, the author doesn’t disappoint. Gorner’s henchman, a pitiless Indo-Chinese thug named Chagrin, has a habit of ripping people’s tongues out with pliers, and there’s some very nasty business involving eardrums and a set of chopsticks.
Comments
David Short
June 16th, 2008 8:44pmThe Spy Who Loved Me was not a 'book' but a short story. And it was written in the first person, from a woman's viewpoint. I don't think any other writer has equalled Fleming's perception in that task, except perhaps William Boyd with Braazaville Beach.
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David Leigh
June 14th, 2008 5:12pmThe Arnott supercharger, three gold rings and various other details are just two instances of how Devil May Care is nothing more than a "paint-by-numbers" Bond novel and capture the essence of neither Ian Fleming nor Bond. All involved should be ashamed.
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Graham Rye
June 6th, 2008 12:58pmAnyone believing that Sebastian Faulk's new Bond novel DEVIL MAY CARE is *anything* like an Ian Fleming 007 novel, and heaven forbid, is an improvement on the original is either one of the following or all of them: (tick box as applicable)
1. Haven't read any of Ian Fleming's Bond novels.
2. Didn't understand any of Ian Fleming's Bond novels.
3. A complete idiot!
If this 'novel' had come across any decent editor's/publisher's desk in manuscript form with the author's name Fred Bloggs on the title page it would have ended up in the wastepaper basket where it belongs.
An insult to the memory of Ian Fleming and everything he wrote!
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Ryan R. Scott
June 6th, 2008 2:00amWell-written article, Charles. Nice to read your thoughts on Devil May Care. Only one nagging little error sticks out for this Fleming purist - you mention Leiter lost his limbs to the shark in Thunderball, when it was actually Live and Let Die. But no harm done! Keep up the good work.
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