The interesting part about that book is, it’s very much down-to-earth. I’m not sure if it’s the later books that made James Bond “jump the shark”, or if those were the movies. This isn’t even so much as a spy thriller, and more of a noir, to be honest.
Funny, the book was written when Beria was still alive.
One bit that is hard to get used to is the outright misogyny of Bond. And those that know me also know that I don’t use that term lightly.
I’ll just put here the quotes:
“Women were for recreation. On a job, they got in the way and fogged things up with sex and hurt feelings and all the emotional baggage they carried around. One had to look out for them and take care of them.”
“These blithering women who thought they could do a man’s work. Why the hell couldn’t they stay at home and mind their pots and pans and stick to their frocks and gossip and leave men’s work to the men. And now for this to happen to him, just when the job had come off so beautifully. For Vesper to fall for an old trick like that and get herself snatched and probably held to ransom like some bloody heroine in a strip cartoon. The silly bitch.”
Such a hero:
“He gazed for a moment into the mirror and wondered about Vesper’s morals. He wanted her cold and arrogant body. He wanted to see tears and desire in her remote blue eyes and to take the ropes of her black hair in his hands and bend her long body back under his.”
I find it interesting that through the book, James Bond doesn’t actually kill anyone.
The two Bulgarians blow themselves, thinking that a real bomb is the smoke bomb. Le Chifre and his henchmen are killed by Smersh/KGB. Vespa overdoses on sleeping pills, unable to bear the guild of being a Soviet spy.
Also, I thought that Bond’s obsession with food and drink is related to the fact that rationing in Britain ended only in ’54. The novel was written in ’53.