437 replies to this topic

[Dr. Noah]

Samantha Weinberg's other notable work is a non fiction book about a rare fish. I'm not sure gaining mass market appeal is one of her aims.

I'm sure that she'd prefer to've sold to millions and might well be disappointed at the relatively poor sales. But I don't think that necessarily means that she's "glad it's over". That seems a pretty big assumption.

True. But she didn't take the job of a continuation series to find fewer readers. And knowing what IFP paid Benson, Gardner, etc., she wasn't doing it for a huge paycheck. I'd bet she's ready to move on.

[Single-O-Seven]

Samantha Weinberg's other notable work is a non fiction book about a rare fish. I'm not sure gaining mass market appeal is one of her aims.

I'm sure that she'd prefer to've sold to millions and might well be disappointed at the relatively poor sales. But I don't think that necessarily means that she's "glad it's over". That seems a pretty big assumption.

True. But she didn't take the job of a continuation series to find fewer readers. And knowing what IFP paid Benson, Gardner, etc., she wasn't doing it for a huge paycheck. I'd bet she's ready to move on.

Might I ask just how much the continuation authors do get paid? I remember Raymond Benson stating writing a Bond novel was like a full time job without the full time salary to match. I always assumed there'd be some decent money involved, but apparently not.

[MarkA]

Weinberg I think will be pretty glad it's over, too. She was writing to 500 people.

She may have been writing to 5, 500, 5,000 the fact remains she has continued the Bond novels far more artistically successful than DMC. Selling loads of books and being popular have nothing to do with being good.

[Trident]

One also has to take into account that a key factor of DMC's selling figures simply is the unprecedented amount of publicity generated by IFP for this book. Which other book in the last 10 years; no, which other book ever has had a similar media coverage, a title song (of all things!), a series of quite spectacular events for the final presentation? Which other book has had its sales figures pushed months in advance by huge pre-orders for the major book-store chains long before anybody ever has been able to read a single line? I can only think of Harry Potter at the moment. You may prove me wrong, but this kind of media-Blitz for a book hasn't happened before.


Not coming form GB, I'm in a position to see where the book's sales figures linger when the overblown hype is absent: well below the radar of any bestseller list. Likewise its media coverage concentrates for the main part on the outlandish PR-campaign (Fifty London, Thames boatride and so on). The book itself is hardly given more than a few sarcastic sentences and professional reviewers ignore it almost completely. I daresay German sales figures of DMC will not do that much better than the last translated Benson did. And I'd be very surprised if other countries lacking the GB-hype-treatment will do much better.


On the other hand there is no doubt that practically any book of the franchise could have profited from a marketing campaign similar to DMC's. Unfortunately, none other has had this kind of backing and fortune favours DMC.

[Dr. Noah]

Quoting Raymond Benson in a great interview with Zencat:

http://commanderbond.net/article/2306

Q: Why do you think the Bond novels don’t sell as well as they once did?

A: There’s no simple reason. I’ve heard fans complain about the lack of promotion and all that and to some extent that could be a part of it. But the real reason lies in the fact that there is apathy toward Bond novels on the retail side of the publishing business. There seems to be an attitude on the bookshop level that Bond novels don’t sell and so they don’t order many copies. The books aren’t prominently displayed in the shops and therefore go unnoticed. Reviewers tend to ignore them, as they are thought of as inferior imitations of Ian Fleming. Make no mistake—Gardner’s Bond books and my Bond books were not failures. They made money for the publishers. There was never a title that was in the red. The publishers had it down to a science as to how many copies to print. They knew how many they would sell. I think Zero Minus Ten’s first printing in America was something like 30,000. In Britain there were only 5,000 printed. That’s not a tremendous amount, but they all sold. The book was reprinted in both countries. But in order to be a New York Times Bestseller, a book has to sell at least 100,000. It’s been a long, long time since a Bond novel sold that many copies. I think that’s one reason why IFP chose to suspend the books for a while, even though both Hodder and Putnam were happy with the sales and would have kept going. The problem is that very few non-Bond fans seek out the books and buy them. They serve a niche market. The Star Wars and Star Trek books do better than Bond novels because there’s a much bigger fan base for those franchises. Another reason could be that people are so indoctrinated by the films that the books may seem like footnotes. Since the filmmakers don’t bother to film John Gardner’s or my books, book retailers can’t expect them to move in great numbers. It’s a shame, really.

Now there's the fastest selling book in Penguin history, the most reviewed book of the summer, and a new agent handling all future Bond books.

Kiss Sebastian's best-selling, critically-respected , fanboys!!!

[Trident]

Quoting Raymond Benson in a great interview with Zencat:

http://commanderbond.net/article/2306

But the real reason lies in the fact that there is apathy toward Bond novels on the retail side of the publishing business. There seems to be an attitude on the bookshop level that Bond novels don’t sell and so they don’t order many copies. The books aren’t prominently displayed in the shops and therefore go unnoticed. Reviewers tend to ignore them, as they are thought of as inferior imitations of Ian Fleming.

And exactly this is what IFP has changed with DMC. No more apathy on the retail side. From the start it was to be a major marketing event that was announced almost three years in advance, public awareness for DMC constantly heightened during this period, cumulating in a succession of PR-events that pushed DMC's publishing into the headlines.

[Dr. Noah]

Might I ask just how much the continuation authors do get paid? I remember Raymond Benson stating writing a Bond novel was like a full time job without the full time salary to match. I always assumed there'd be some decent money involved, but apparently not.

It's a fraction of what an author would get for his own original ideas. I have a friend who wrote a book for the TV show Lost, which is huge in America, and the money he was paid added up to a total of three house payments.

The other deal is continuation novels are time-based. They're publisher-driven, not author driven. You get a date it needs to come out and so it will be done by then, ready or not. People complaining Faulks wrote it in a contained period of time don't seem to understand that. THAT WAS THE JOB! He couldn't sit on it for a year and wait until Fleming was 101.

I don't have any experience with continuation novels, myself. But if you get a film novelization offer in a contract for a screenplay, you usually refuse, since it's almost always more work than money, and you let the studio hire another author to translate the script. I can't imagine continuation novels would be much different -- somebody else owns the idea and characters.

And exactly this is what IFP has changed with DMC. No more apathy on the retail side. From the start it was to be a major marketing event that was announced almost three years in advance, public awareness for DMC constantly heightened during this period, cumulating in a succession of PR-events that pushed DMC's publishing into the headlines.

You didn't read the whole thing.

Reviewers tend to ignore them, as they are thought of as inferior imitations of Ian Fleming. Make no mistake—Gardner’s Bond books and my Bond books were not failures. They made money for the publishers. There was never a title that was in the red. The publishers had it down to a science as to how many copies to print. They knew how many they would sell. I think Zero Minus Ten’s first printing in America was something like 30,000. In Britain there were only 5,000 printed. That’s not a tremendous amount, but they all sold. The book was reprinted in both countries. But in order to be a New York Times Bestseller, a book has to sell at least 100,000. It’s been a long, long time since a Bond novel sold that many copies. I think that’s one reason why IFP chose to suspend the books for a while, even though both Hodder and Putnam were happy with the sales and would have kept going. The problem is that very few non-Bond fans seek out the books and buy them. They serve a niche market.

They knew what DMC would sell, the knew what MD would sell. It's not about marketing Bond books, it's about which books CAN be marketed successfully.

What a few dozen fanboys say on a fan site about THEIR opinions on quality doesn't mean much. They're the 5,000 readers Benson's talking about.

[Trident]

You didn't read the whole thing.

Oh, yes. I did.

[Dr. Noah]

You didn't read the whole thing.

Oh, yes. I did.

Sorry. You didn't understand the whole thing.

They knew going in they had a popular author and a book that would sell, and they knew going in that Weinberg's book wouldn't do well enough to warrant the publicity, etc., and that it would just sell to the usual fans. (Or I guess I should say, it wouldn't earn enough back to make the marketing worthwhile.)

I assure you, if they thought that boating the latest Moneypenny Diaries up the Thames would make it a bestseller, they'd do it. I'm sure Weinberg's lovely and they hope the best for her, and the series they own. Heck, I enjoy the books, too! But between that and DMC, they knew one could be a bestseller and one wasn't going to be.

Frankly, one author was writing to an audience that already knows Bond, and the other was assigned to reintroduce Bond to a world that stopped reading the books 40 years ago.

And fanwank aside, he OBVIOUSLY succeeded admirably.

[The diarist]

Hi there, fanboys, fanwanks and other lovely people. Meandering through CBN of a Sunday evening, I happened upon this thread and wanted to put my side across:

1. I don't write purely for money. That being said, I got paid a decent amount for writing TMD - from my publishers - who will probably not be seeing much in the way of profit. But that's their concern (fault).

2. Much as you are undoubtedly great people, I did not write the diaries purely for you. Indeed, I have to confess that I had no inkling there was such a dedicated Fleming fan base. I only discovered CBN and the like after finishing Guardian Angel. It was my hope - and that of IFP and John Murray - that Moneypenny would appeal to a wide readership, and we were optimistic about how it would be received. However, partly due to a massive - with hindsight - marketing misjudgement on the first volume, they never really got out of the starting gate.

3. I've loved writing Moneypenny, and while I'm rather relieved it's over - I've been working pretty much flat out for nearly 4 years, with two small children nipping at my heels - 'glad' is not the word I'd choose. I'd never tried fiction before, and I probably still wouldn't have had the guts to do so had this not come along. (And, incidentally, my book about an obscure fish sold more than 100,000 copies worldwide, is still in print, and under option to a movie company).

4. I love the fact that the fans have enjoyed Moneypenny. Thank you all of you. If you really like it, please spread the word - and outside the community too. Amazing as it may seem, a large proportion of its readers (not in themself very numerous) have not read a Bond book before, as far as I can tell - certainly those that write to me haven't. I think she'll always be a part of me, and even when I've moved onto pastures new, I'll still visit you guys from time to time (so don't be rude!).

5. Contrary to what has been surmised in another thread, I didn't have the idea of the final twist until I was halfway through writing Final Fling. I went back then, and 'reverse engineered' the ending, but anyone who saw its roots in book one was ahead of me!

Thanks again. Over and out.

The Diarist.

[Dr. Noah]

5. Contrary to what has been surmised in another thread, I didn't have the idea of the final twist until I was halfway through writing Final Fling. I went back then, and 'reverse engineered' the ending, but anyone who saw its roots in book one was ahead of me!

Wow! Thanks for posting.

If you're still there (not to give away the twist), what were you going to do with the character of Bond before that?

What did YOU think of the Faulks book?

(And sorry about the "glad" inference, now proven untrue.)

[MarkA]

Dr Noah your points are well made but do you have to be so aggressive and after all they are still just your opinion. When I judge the merits of something I couldn't give a toss whether it was hugely popular or the critics loved it. If it doesn't rock my boat then I will say so. And I did find DMC rather safe and rather dull. And Samantha Weinberg's books an interesting, clever and exciting twist on writing a Bond continuation novel. And I am not at all surprised she took the time to write here. I spoke to her briefly after the talk at the Imperial War Museum and she seemed genuinely humbled by all the praise she was getting from us Fanboys for want of a better word.

[Dr. Noah]

Dr Noah your points are well made but do you have to be so aggressive and after all they are still just your opinion. When I judge the merits of something I couldn't give a toss whether it was hugely popular or the critics loved it. If it doesn't rock my boat then I will say so. And I did find DMC rather safe and rather dull. And Samantha Weinberg's books an interesting, clever and exciting twist on writing a Bond continuation novel. And I am not at all surprised she took the time to write here. I spoke to her briefly after the talk at the Imperial War Museum and she seemed genuinely humbled by all the praise she was getting from us Fanboys for want of a better word.

Well, that's exactly my point. I have NEVER said you should like it because it's a bestseller. But people (not you) calling DMC a failure because THEY don't like it personally -- when it obviously ISN'T a failure -- rub me exactly the same way. As do people who feel they have to dislike one book to like the other.

[zencat]

Wow, great to hear for The Diarist herself! Thank you for posting.

One thing I'm noticing, not just here but across all the fan boards, is there seems to be a real turning toward The Moneypenny Diaries in this post-DMC world. While it seems some fans are, incredibly, just discovering them, many now seem willing to give them a read after digging in and taking a sort of protest position that they would wait for IFP to release a "proper" continuation novel. Well, they got it, and now they're willing to broaden their horizons and sample IFP's other offerings.

TMD have had a slow but steady upwards interest trajectory. I think this will continue now at speed and, at the end of the day, I think we'll find the Moneypenny Diaries are going to be very widely read and praised among fans.

[Dr. Noah]

Wow, great to hear for The Diarist herself! Thank you for posting.

One thing I'm noticing, not just here but across all the fan boards, is there seems to be a real turning toward The Moneypenny Diaries in this post-DMC world. While it seems some fans are, incredibly, just discovering them, many now seem willing to give them a read after digging in and taking a sort of protest position that they would wait for IFP to release a "proper" continuation novel. Well, they got it, and now they're willing to broaden their horizons and sample IFP's other offerings.

TMD have had a slow but steady upwards interest trajectory. I think this will continue now at speed and, at the end of the day, I think we'll find the Moneypenny Diaries are going to be very widely read and praised among fans.

It's not so much discovering them as FINDING them. I can't find a bookseller who'll send a Secret Servant hardcover to the US. So I think they'll be extremely valuable. I enjoyed Guardian Angel, but I'm waiting to read Final Fling until I finish the second book.

It's too bad she doesn't get a percentage of the re-sale of the books. (And I hope Higson renogetiated his deal after Silverfin took off.)

Only in a fan forum would a positive reaction to a book on the very subject of the fan forum be so freaking objectionable. I enjoyed DMC. I enjoyed the QOS teaser. (Try getting through THOSE threads!) I enjoyed Higson and Pearson and Amis and Benson and Weinberg, and thank them for giving me so much pleasure.

I enjoy all takes and tributes for a fictional character who in the purest sense ceased to exist when the creator died 40-some years ago. Whatever was supposed to happen to 007 after TMWTGG died with Fleming. The rest is all speculation and fanwankery, and SHOULD be fun, whether Bond stays in the 60's (Amis, Pearson, Faulks and Weinberg), or just keeps the name and exists in a world outside of the timeline (Gardner and Benson, the films).

I'm grateful that any of it exists at all.

[MarkA]

I can't find a bookseller who'll send a Secret Servant hardcover to the US

I did hear the hardback first edition of Secret Servant is the rare one out of the three books. Perhaps the print run was small. But on various sites like Abe it is already upwards of £300!

[zencat]

I can't find a bookseller who'll send a Secret Servant hardcover to the US

I did hear the hardback first edition of Secret Servant is the rare one out of the three books. Perhaps the print run was small. But on various sites like Abe it is already upwards of £300!

Really? I'll be darned.

Ironic that we shell out big bucks for all these DMC special editions...yet it's the humble little Secret Servant hardcover that rockets in value. Maybe a good metaphor for the series itself.

[Dr. Noah]

I did hear the hardback first edition of Secret Servant is the rare one out of the three books. Perhaps the print run was small. But on various sites like Abe it is already upwards of £300!

It's impossible to get at a decent price. It's like Gardner's Cold -- I'm interested, but how many hundreds of dollars do I want to pay to read it? I understand it's a limited run, but I can buy an early Fleming First Edition for that much.

[MarkA]

Ironic that we shell out big bucks for all these DMC special editions...yet it's the humble little Secret Servant hardcover that rockets in value. Maybe a good metaphor for the series itself.

Yea, the thing is I took along my hard cover of the first book for Samantha Weinberg to sign at the Imperial War Museum and someone said to me you should have taken the second book as that's the rare one. So that's how I found out.

It's impossible to get at a decent price. It's like Gardner's Cold

I suppose it is all down to supply and demand. The later Gardner's also had extremely small print runs, where as Fleming's later books had pretty high prints. The same thing effects the Benson film novelisations especially TND.

Edited by MarkA, 13 July 2008 - 11:23 PM.

[Dr. Noah]

Ironic that we shell out big bucks for all these DMC special editions...yet it's the humble little Secret Servant hardcover that rockets in value. Maybe a good metaphor for the series itself.

The DMC stuff is going to be worth a lot, but you can't make as much because they charged so much upfront for the signed edition(s) and the Bentley edition, etc., and limited the run intentionally. (They've finally disappeared from E-Bay.)

Not that it matters. I've never sold one of my Bond books, and probably never will. My kids will be rich, though...

[MkB]

I did hear the hardback first edition of Secret Servant is the rare one out of the three books. Perhaps the print run was small. But on various sites like Abe it is already upwards of £300!

It's impossible to get at a decent price. It's like Gardner's Cold -- I'm interested, but how many hundreds of dollars do I want to pay to read it? I understand it's a limited run, but I can buy an early Fleming First Edition for that much.

It is amazing. £300! Nonsense.
Dr. Noah, I hope you'll find a second hand copy at a decent price on Amazon MarketPlace or something like that.

And if I may add something:

But people (not you) calling DMC a failure because THEY don't like it personally -- when it obviously ISN'T a failure -- rub me exactly the same way. As do people who feel they have to dislike one book to like the other.

Well, I have long been wary of the notion of "obvious". I guess some people call DMC a failure because it corresponds to THEIR definition of a failure in this case (and I have read some very argumented posts on this board). It doesn't correspond to yours: fine! To each his own, this is what discussion is for.
And please, I hope you'll give me and some others on these boards credit for not being only "fanboys", having read some other books beyond the Fleming / Bond ones, and being able to decide whether we like or dislike a book independently of our appreciation of another.

[Dr. Noah]

It is amazing. £300! Nonsense.
Dr. Noah, I hope you'll find a second hand copy at a decent price on Amazon MarketPlace or something like that.

Amazon UK has two, fairly cheap, but neither will ship to the US.

Well, I have long been wary of the notion of "obvious". I guess some people call DMC a failure because it corresponds to THEIR definition of a failure in this case (and I have read some very argumented posts on this board). It doesn't correspond to yours: fine! To each his own, this is what discussion is for.

I have no problem with somebody saying they don't like it -- that's what this thread is for... and WHO CARES?

I go back a couple weeks to Zencat saying he bought a special edition -- in a thread ABOUT special editions, not here -- and somebody saying he wasted his money on a rotten book. WORTHLESS TO YOU! YOU POST ON A FAN BOARD! YOUR OPINION MEANS NOTHING TO THE REST OF THE WORLD! LET HIM BUY HIS FREAKING BOOK AND ENJOY IT!

And please, I hope you'll give me and some others on these boards credit for not being only "fanboys", having read some other books beyond the Fleming / Bond ones, and being able to decide whether we like or dislike a book independently of our appreciation of another.

Hey, I call myself a fanboy! It beats fanoldman.

But you gotta admit, these kinds of continuation story discussions used to get fantasy geeks beat up in high school... And posters complaining about the quality of the writing because they don't like having to look up French words is pretty hilarious. Makes you root for the high school bullies...

[Major Tallon]

Dear Ms. Weinberg,

If you ever stroll by this thread, please accept my appreciation for your wonderful work on The Moneypenny Diaries. Your books have been a marvellous addition to the world of James Bond, and I, among many hereabouts, are grateful that you created them and shared them with us.

[Trident]

4. I love the fact that the fans have enjoyed Moneypenny. Thank you all of you. If you really like it, please spread the word - and outside the community too.

I'm not yet through with 'Guardian Angel' but can already assure you that I ejoy it tremendously. I already purchased 'Secret Servant' and 'Final Fling' and, while it may take me yet a little longer to finish your series, I'll certainly recommend TMD to everybody. Really tremendous fun to read. Thank you very much!

[[dark]]

Hi there, fanboys, fanwanks and other lovely people. Meandering through CBN of a Sunday evening, I happened upon this thread and wanted to put my side across:

1. I don't write purely for money. That being said, I got paid a decent amount for writing TMD - from my publishers - who will probably not be seeing much in the way of profit. But that's their concern (fault).

2. Much as you are undoubtedly great people, I did not write the diaries purely for you. Indeed, I have to confess that I had no inkling there was such a dedicated Fleming fan base. I only discovered CBN and the like after finishing Guardian Angel. It was my hope - and that of IFP and John Murray - that Moneypenny would appeal to a wide readership, and we were optimistic about how it would be received. However, partly due to a massive - with hindsight - marketing misjudgement on the first volume, they never really got out of the starting gate.

3. I've loved writing Moneypenny, and while I'm rather relieved it's over - I've been working pretty much flat out for nearly 4 years, with two small children nipping at my heels - 'glad' is not the word I'd choose. I'd never tried fiction before, and I probably still wouldn't have had the guts to do so had this not come along. (And, incidentally, my book about an obscure fish sold more than 100,000 copies worldwide, is still in print, and under option to a movie company).

4. I love the fact that the fans have enjoyed Moneypenny. Thank you all of you. If you really like it, please spread the word - and outside the community too. Amazing as it may seem, a large proportion of its readers (not in themself very numerous) have not read a Bond book before, as far as I can tell - certainly those that write to me haven't. I think she'll always be a part of me, and even when I've moved onto pastures new, I'll still visit you guys from time to time (so don't be rude!).

5. Contrary to what has been surmised in another thread, I didn't have the idea of the final twist until I was halfway through writing Final Fling. I went back then, and 'reverse engineered' the ending, but anyone who saw its roots in book one was ahead of me!

Thanks again. Over and out.

The Diarist.

Excellent to see you grace the boards again, "Kate"!

The Moneypenny Diaries: Final Fling is among the best of the continuation novels (and, in my opinion, among the best of the James Bond novels period) and I've voiced my opinions to that effect in multiple threads - and outside of the fan community (indeed, back in early 2006, when I went travelling through Europe, my two travelling buddies, having never read a 007 book, eagerly devoured The Moneypenny Diaries: Guardian Angel and looked forward to the second volume of diaries).

It's lamentable that the series "never really got out of the starting gate", as the potential was certainly there: Miss Moneypenny is almost as instantly recognisable as James Bond himself (considerably due to Fleming's knack with names). And, needless to say, the quality of writing was superb.

While in London, I found the paperback edition of The Moneypenny Diaries: Secret Servant to be everywhere - especially noticeable with its eye-catching cover art. Here's hoping The Moneypenny Diaries: Final Fling will reach a similar audience when released in paperback (maybe alongside a rejacketed The Moneypenny Diaries: Guardian Angel?).

In any case, it's gratifying to see more fans finally discovering the joy of this series.

One thing I'm noticing, not just here but across all the fan boards, is there seems to be a real turning toward The Moneypenny Diaries in this post-DMC world. While it seems some fans are, incredibly, just discovering them, many now seem willing to give them a read after digging in and taking a sort of protest position that they would wait for IFP to release a "proper" continuation novel. Well, they got it, and now they're willing to broaden their horizons and sample IFP's other offerings.

This may be the crux of it, zen. Perhaps it's become apparent that these may be Miss Moneypenny's diaries, but they are James Bond novels.

[MarkA]

This may be the crux of it, zen. Perhaps it's become apparent that these may be Miss Moneypenny's diaries, but they are James Bond novels.

Seconded. I have in some people's view been so critical of various Bond continuation novels in the past, that these particular books have given me so much pleasure and in many ways justified my previous criticism of all the also rans. These at last are the real thing. And by taken such a left field approach to Bond have knocked all the others apart from Colonel Sun out of the park. (But I admit I have a soft spot for Young Bond, because I thought it such a lousy idea that somehow worked).

Edited by MarkA, 14 July 2008 - 09:25 PM.

[hcmv007]

OK, (Cracks knuckles).


Good: I liked the supporting characters created for this novel. The names were a nod to Fleming, and unlike Gardner, it didn't feel to forced on the reader. I liked that Bond was in a fragile state at the start of the book, Fleming's best 007 stories had Bond in some sort of malaise, so that was what got me hooked on the book. Scarlett proved to not be an airhead, which was nice, and the twist in the end was one that was hinted albeit briefly, and paid off well. A lot of the action sequences were well diagrammed and easy to follow.


Bad: Do all Bond villains have to suffer some deformity of some sort? Red Grant IMO was one of the best villains in all of Fleming's novel, although his deformity was inside his head. A lot of the language was forced, and most of it was not needed. I get that Mathis and Bond have certain tastes, but enough with the fancy meals! The time of the story also bothered me. Fleming wanted Bond stories to take place 10 seconds from now, placing him in the 1960's takes us back 40 years, and it really set me back a bit. Faulks at times didn't seem comfortable with Bond, a big no-no. Many Bond fans lamented the departure of Raymond Benson, who captured Bond so well in modern times. The fact is, a better writer was needed for a project like this. If the fine folks at Penguin Books want to make Bond a perennial bestseller they need to shell out some money and get an experienced writer to tackle 007. Otherwise, Bond fans will continue to get mediocre Bond stories, and the titles will not sell.

[chriso]

Two weeks ago I bought the german version of 'Devil May Care' which is 'Der Tod ist nur der Anfang' (Death is only the beginning)

Unfortuntely I don't know how the original version is but the german book has been excellent translated.

The book's locatons, characters and Bond himself are very good described, it's really like one of Ian Fleming's novels. The story takes place in the 60's which is great, because the 1960's are the typically settings for 007.

Sebastian Faulks did a great job with his Bond novel and I've to say that 'Devil May Care' is an excellent tribute to the creator of Bond, Ian Fleming.

[Mister E]

Many Bond fans lamented the departure of Raymond Benson

I certaintly haven't.

[Skudor]

...
Was Faulks honestly excited to be writing this? To me, it felt bored... 'let's get this over with'... or something.

That pretty much sums up my interpretation of the book. Written by someone as a laugh but without any love or enthusiasm.