8 replies to this topic

[RossMan]

This book, like the movie, is highly underrated. I know that Fleming never completed it and that it is rather weak compared to other Bond books but it really is better than most people say it is. I'll admit that it is not one of the best, probably average, but it is still a decent and enjoyable Bond book, I'd still favor it over Gardner's Man from Brarbarossa or Death Is Forever and Fleming's TSWLM(the only Bond books that I just don't like).

I think that this would have been better off as a short story, just to tell us what happends to Bond after YOLT, then a lot of that filler material could be taken out. This just did not have enough plot going to make a full novel out of it. I was very disapointed with the ending. WHen I first read it I was expecting some great duel between BOnd and Scaramanga but it never comes. Bond simply shoots an injured, dying man. It also describes Scaramanga's marksmanship but that is never really shown. He only shoots a couple of birds, and I think one hoodlum. I do love the opening with the brainwashed Bond. WHenever I read YOLT, I never can help but to read this one right after it.

Also, was it true that Kingsley Amis was the one who finished this novel after Fleming's death?

[General Koskov]

I like this one a lot, a great 'ending' to Bond with the refusing a knighthood. The beggining is the greatest sequence ever and it was so agrivating that Eon never did a continuity thing where Bond was brainwashed. Not a very interesting plot by Scaramanga, and I was expecting it to continue after the train ride, but the atmosphere makes up for everything. The movie could have taken a lesson from this: you don't need a friggin' solar-powered laser gun to make a Bond adventure!

[Glenn]

This was the first Bond book that I read (almost 20 years ago) and it still remains my favourite. It is most certainly under-rated. Now, I'm off to read it yet again!

[walther]

This is currently the first Fleming novel I have read. I think so far it's going quite good. I skimed through it earlier, but I do think it is unusually short for how good of a pairing of Bond and Scaramanga actually is. I'm going on to Moonraker next, and I hear that's a good one too.

I wonder what would have happened if Fleming was still alive today. Would it change the style of the films? What other interesting Bond adventures and titles would come? Would Fleming have an impact on who would become Bond on screen after Connery? There are so many possiblities...

[White Persian]

Kingsly Amis read over Fleming's manuscript on behalf of Glidrose, but denied that he wrote any of it.
It's not quite true to say that Fleming didn't complete TMWTGG. The completed novel, as published, is all Fleming's work.
What he didn't live to do was give the whole thing a final polish.

I agree that it now seems a lot better than its reputation suggests.

[White Persian]

If he hadn't died, Fleming might easily have had another twenty years of literary output, so there'd have been more Fleming material to adapt, and it might have been treated more faithfully with the author still around.
I doubt whether he'd have had too much influence on casting (JK Rowling is an exception), but Connery's successors would have had the benefit of Fleming's insight into the character. Roger Moore has said that he didn't pick much up at all about Bond from reading the books. A chat over a drink might have made a difference to his approach.

[Icephoenix]

I just wonder what kind of wonderfull, exicting Adventures he would have came up with. And the beautiful Titles to go with them.

[RossMan]

White Persian (09 Jan, 2002 12:20 p.m.):

It's not quite true to say that Fleming didn't complete TMWTGG. The completed novel, as published, is all Fleming's work.
What he didn't live to do was give the whole thing a final polish.

Yes, that's it, it feels like reading the first/rough draft of a manuscript. I'm sure if Fleming had the oppurtunity to go over it would rate much higher.

[Bon-san]

Some of this book's chapter headings alone make this a worthy addition to the Bond/Fleming pantheon. "Ballcock, And Other Trouble" is just fantastic. I'm glad this thread is here. Both the film and print versions of TMWTGG truly do get dissed far too often.