223 replies to this topic

[spynovelfan]

Noted. The "piece", such as it is, was written in the throes of the depressingly cretinous stuff that was appearing here in the light of the release of Quantum of Solace. Its intention, aside from playing a comedy game with structure which I appear to have been alone in enjoying, was indeed to demonstrate how absurd internet criticism can be - it is, indeed, deliberately extreme, but perhaps no more extreme than some of the unmitigated pus that was being bandied about about mr Forster or Mr Bradley or Mr White and Ms Keys. By focusing on a different subject, I would have intended to draw that out and have people think.

The internet is certainly a wild and woolly place filled with absurd and often moronic criticism, but I don't think was made any more so in the aftermath of the release of Quantum of Solace. I also get down about it sometimes, but there is surely a difference between 16-year-olds posting that Another Way To Die is 'the crappiest song ever sung' or worse to you stooping to, not their level but close, in a front page article on the website. Had this been a forum post I might have reacted a bit differently.

I do understand the frustration (and felt it reading the piece), but it did seem a little to be wallowing in that to make the point, and it depressed me. The site is better than this, and so are you, and you well know it. One thing I really appreciate about this website, in fact, is just how much extraordinaily intelligent and meaningful criticism there is. It may be a small percentage of the overall output, but it's there. Your article on Fleming's THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN is one of the best pieces of criticism of that novel, and Fleming in general, that I've read anywhere. Seven years after you wrote it, several of us had, I think, an absurd, diverting but nevertheless enlightening discussion about it here in these very forums alongside conversations about the running time of QoS and speculation about George Lazenby's putative fourth film as a Bond villain in a Star Trek film directed by Quentin Tarantino.

I think this website is often testament to the positive side of the internet, and criticism on it, and I think you are very often one of the leading lights in that regard. We all know theoretically that the interweb opens up an infinite number of possibilities, and from experience that it tends to be slanging matches about nothing. But then, look there... an essay by someone with a double first from Oxford on Ian Fleming. Look there... The Heart Bleeds Ice, a James Bond novella that I believe rivals Ian Fleming's own work.

The reality of the world we live in is that Kingsley Amis' style of criticism no longer exists, and has been and will increasingly be replaced by criticism that is transmitted via the medium we're using now. Such criticism will have to struggle through a bewildering morass to be read, but this is where the great thinkers of our time will increasingly spend their time and express their thoughts.

Perhaps I have more faith in human communication than you. Or perhaps I didn't read every thread about why the second trailer for Quantum of Solace has ruined every film ever made for eternity.

Timing was against me for many reasons particular to me - you make an especially pertinent point about deadlines! - and now, the moment lost, it probably does stand as knocking at an already well-opened door.

Well, even if you wrote it months ago, and despite it being part of your ongoing series, I do slightly question the entire purpose of this series. Your first reviews of Benson's books were in a similar vein, but I think with every one you concluded, despite royally ripping them apart, that they were worth investigating. That should surely be the minimum for a James Bond website. Here's some Bond-related stuff you might not have investigated yet. Here's someone who appreciates and knows a lot about Bond and what they thought of it. But, in general, we're looking at this because you mightn't have investigated it yet, so go forth, read it, investigate yourself! Your first essays in this series were in this spirit, and you even structured them with Strengths and Weaknesses. I think that was fair and respectful and the minimum, really. Your structural games aside, if you lose that initial premise of 'Here's some stuff we think is worth you Bond fans out there investigating', why bother reviewing a 2001 Bond novel at all? I'm sure you could write an extremely diverting and entertaining and insightful dissertation on a single episode of the James Bond Junior cartoon series... but why would you, especially if it were mainly to say it was a piece of crap? As I say, sledgehammers and walnuts.

I appreciate that the site's free, I can take myself off somewhere, you're doing this for nuffink, guv, and it's not as though everything's budgeted, etc, but can't you, please, turn your attention to, say, DEVIL MAY CARE? Might have been more relevant and useful. Or Higson's series? Or more on Fleming? I'm not saying Raymond Benson should be ignored, but it just seems an awful waste of your time and talents if this is the treatment you're going to give him.

Whilst I wouldn't readily accept a charge of bullying, if you do believe that there is material in there that is personally abusive to Mr Benson as a person, rather than abusive to the qualities of the enterprise that he took part in (the flaws of which cannot all be his responsibility), I am happy to remove.

I think this is part of my problem with this, that you don't see this distinction. There isn't anything in it that is personally abusive to Raymond Benson, but that is not the point. Imagine for a moment that you had finished a novel and you sent it to someone asking them to read it and tell you what they thought. To make it clearer, actually, let's say that someone is a literary agent or publishing professional. If their reply were 5,000 words in which they ripped the draft apart and told you how crap it was in no uncertain terms, you would be mortified, I'm sure. But they wouldn't need to be personally abusive to take it to a whole other level, would they? There's a difference, isn't there, between ripping something apart in a spirit that is generally respectful and courteous to the writer, and then there is what you've done. How would you feel if the agent didn't simply rip apart the structure but just went to town on everything as if it were an enormous joke and your work were scum under their shoe they could wipe off and hold up to the light and rhapsodise over its scumminess? How would you feel if they sent you back something in the vein of this piece? You're not a literary agent and you weren't sent the manuscript by the author... but isn't it really worse, because you've done this in public, and to a fellow writer? That's why I think it's close to bullying. It's not that you've taken the piss out of Raymond Benson the man. But you have taken the piss out of his work, haven't you? Taking the piss is fine, I guess, and there's room for it in the world. But was it really necessary on a James Bond website, in 2009, to take the piss so mercilessly out of the 2001 Bond novel Never Dream of Dying? Would you send this essay to Raymond Benson - if not, why not? And... you already have.

I can see what purpose it might have served you, but what purpose did it serve this website or the visitors to it, other than to have a laugh at Benson?

[DAN LIGHTER]

I have yet to read any Raymond Benson books. But I look forward to it and would hope we get behind and offer our surport as fans to another fan. Raymond Benson clearly has a lot of respect for Ian Flemings work.

Edited by DAN LIGHTER, 05 March 2009 - 04:58 PM.

[zencat]

I can see what purpose it might have served you, but what purpose did it serve this website or the visitors to it, other than to have a laugh at Benson?

Reminds me of the heyday of OO7 Magazine when Graham would pretty much slaughter every aspect of James Bond post 1969. As a young fan, it was always painful and confusing why my "fanclub" magazine was so devoted to trashing what is was "celebrating." But it had awesome pictures, so I looked past the words. And then I learned to love Graham as a salty dog...like I love Jim.

Did CBn ever do an official Devil May Care review? After DMC, I hope people can see just how hard it is for an author of any pedigree to come up with a good Bond novel. For me, Benson smoothly threaded that needle six times. There isn't a bad book in the batch, IMO.

[Double-Oh Agent]

After DMC, I hope people can see just how hard it is for an author of any pedigree to come up with a good Bond novel. For me, Benson smoothly threaded that needle six times. There isn't a bad book in the batch, IMO.

I agree. Raymond Benson came up with good, creative, and exciting plots in every one of his novels, and I liked them all.

[[dark]]

After DMC, I hope people can see just how hard it is for an author of any pedigree to come up with a good Bond novel.

The thing is, I believe Faulks did have it in him to write a good Bond novel - he just didn't seem to give the project the attention and care it deserved.

As for Benson, I'm ashamed to say the only books of his that I've read are a couple of the film novelisations, and possibly Zero Minus Ten (I'm not sure). Nevertheless, I own them all, and after I've finished reading Gardner's books (next up, Brokenclaw), I'll be tackling them.

[Simon]

I can see what purpose it might have served you, but what purpose did it serve this website or the visitors to it, other than to have a laugh at Benson?

On balance and on this site, I believe the likes and dislikes for the Bond product is fairly even. For every zencat lauding of the next Bond novel, there is a Jim distate for the Brosnan era. Both make points to great effect.

I think the 007 magazine would always do their articles in a non-partisan manner but as for their reviews, I agree that early on, I too experienced some confusion over their distaste for the latest Moore.

Older and wiser, I think I would prefer someone's honest take on a matter.

At the end of the day, good intentions aside, I must admit to not thinking a whole lot about the Benson output. I remember the, "Bond thought, is this love" line and thought, Oh My God. That said, I also thought DMC, by the lauded and established author, to be second rate too. Clearly, anyone can make a hash of what has to be a thankless exercise.

Still think Jim should send his efforts (somewhere) for consideration. And then zencat can lavish his praise and someone else can take up the mantle of picking it to pieces.

And so the world continues to revolve...

[Zorin Industries]

http://www.youtube.c...A...t=1&index=1

This is apt. I think...

[Trident]

While I think Gardner is getting more flak on the average, Benson to me seems to get the harsher one. Gardner's efforts (especially the later ones) are often viewed as a tedious affair that he himself couldn't at all stomach that much and perhaps was relieved to move on from finally.

Benson on the other hand is often much more severely criticised. There's the fact that he is (or used to be) a fanboy. So he's basically one of us, could well be behind one of our screennames. He's apparently proven with his 'Bedside Companion' (which I haven't read myself, thus 'apparently') that he has accumulated an exceptional amount of knowledge on the field (collected in a pre-www-age when it wasn't as easy as today to gather information on any subject, mind you!). So most of us feel that he's 'understood' Bond, or at least hasn't vastly misunderstood him.

Paradoxically though, his official works are sometimes criticised for being little more than 'mere' fanfiction. But wasn't it just that what fans were glad of finally getting? Someone who really cares for his subject (and I have no doubt that Gardner past 1986 or so couldn't care to the extent Benson did)? A 'fanboy'?

And, as a fan, is it really surprising that he ventured to try and give us fans (and he must have known that his books would cater mainly to our merry little community) supposedly the best of both worlds, EON and Fleming?

I agree of course that Benson perhaps should have thought twice before setting out to achieve the basically unachievable. But I wonder what I would have done had I been in his shoes (not that I could ever be)? Could I have withstood the temptation? Don't think so, no. After feeling monumentally drunk with joy when contacted by Glidrose (or was it already IFP by then?) I'd most likely have set out with an astonishingly weired mixture of EON, Fleming, Amis and Gardner to try and please all and everybody. And, instead of doing so, no, by doing so I'd have ed up royally.

Which is of course entirely OK. As long as it's (mere) fanfiction. Once it becomes 'official' the is hitting the fan and everybody feels angry and appaled. Because there are so many who could (and would) have done better. But mostly because the rubbish was done by a fan who should have known better!

I wonder how we'd have looked at the period of ZMT to TMWTRT if we hadn't been told it was Benson? If they were maybe published under Markham pseudonym or even under Gardner? Would have been interesting to see what we'd have made of them under that pretext.

[spynovelfan]

I can see what purpose it might have served you, but what purpose did it serve this website or the visitors to it, other than to have a laugh at Benson?

On balance and on this site, I believe the likes and dislikes for the Bond product is fairly even. For every zencat lauding of the next Bond novel, there is a Jim distate for the Brosnan era. Both make points to great effect.

I agree. I don't see anything wrong with criticising elements of the James Bond universe on a Bond site per se. My point is that this particular article goes - in my opinion! - well beyond what is generally acceptable as literary criticism, and in doing so it destroys any credibilty it might have had as a review of the novel, doesn't do this website any favours and is rather offensive to Raymond Benson. Sorry to be so po-faced about it, but I do think it's a worthwhile working principle that one should only write something about someone's work that one would be prepared to say to them face-to-face. I think that applies to the internet just as it would if one were publishing in the Times Literary Supplement, and the idea that because others don't abide by this principle means one should abandon it and join in and that somehow this can be passed off as a structural 'comedy game' or some sort of 'deliberately extreme' self-referential commentary doesn't wash with me at all, sorry. I think that's akin to punching a weaker boy to the ground and then claiming that you were really metaphorically punching yourself in a piece of performance art that satirised the school authorities. Even if it were the case - what about the boy on the ground?

I mentioned Kingsley Amis in my last post. In 1982, Amis wrote an absolutely blistering review - in the TLS in fact - of John Gardner's FOR SPECIAL SERVICES. Here it is:

'Double-low-tar 7, Licence to Underkill

Ian Fleming's last novel, The Man With The Golden Gun, appeared in 1965, a year after its author's death. I published Colonel Sun: a James Bond Adventure under the pseudonym of Robert Markham in 1968. The next Bond novel, Licence Renewed, by John Gardner, did not come along till 1981. Here now is For Special Services, by the same author.

Quite likely it ill becomes a man placed as I am to say that, whereas its predecessor was bad enough by any reasonable standard, the present offering is an unrelieved disaster all the way from its aptly forgettable title to the photograph of the author-surely an unflattering likeness-on the back of the jacket. If so that is just my bad luck. On the other hand, perhaps I can claim the privilege of at least a momentary venting of indignation at the disrepute into which this publication brings the name and works of Ian Fleming. Let me get something like that said before I have to start being funny and clever and risk letting the thing escape through underkill.

Over the last dozen years the Bond of the books must have been largely overlaid by the Bond of the films, a comic character with lots of gadgets and witty remarks at his disposal. The temptation to let this Bond go the same way must have been considerable, but it has been resisted. Only once is he called upon to round off an action sequence with a yobbo-tickling throwaway of the sort that Sean Connery used to be so good at dropping out of the side of his mouth. No ridiculous feats are required of him. His personal armament seems plausible, his car seems capable of neither flight nor underwater locomotion, his cigarettes in the gunmetal case have the three gold rings and M calls him 007.

Nobody else does, though. The designation is a pure honorific like Warden of the Cinque Ports; some ruling from Brussels or The Hague has put paid to the pristine Double-0 Section and its licence to kill long ago. Even the cigarettes are low-tar. But these and similar changes would hardly show if he had been allowed go keep some other interests and bits of himself, or find new ones. Does he still drink champagne with scrambled eggs and sausages. Wear a lightweight black-and-white dog-tooth check suit in the country? Do twenty slow press-ups each morning? Read Country Life? Ski, play baccarat and golf for high stakes, dive in scuba gear? What happened to that elegant international scene with its grand hotels and yachts? No information.

One thing Bond still does is have girls. There are three in this book, not counting a glimpse of Miss Moneypenny outside M's door. The first is there just for local colour, around at the start, to be dropped as soon as the wheels start turning. She is called Q'ute because she comes from Q Branch. (Q himself is never mentioned, lives only in the films, belongs body and soul to Cubby Broccoli, the producer). Q'ute is liberated and a champion of feminism. Luckily she has only two lines, but one of these contains a jovial mild obscenity, and a moment later there comes a terrifically subtle reference to the famous moment in the film of Dr No when Bond said, 'Something big's coming up' in ambiguous circumstances and got the hoped-for laugh from the first audiences, thus, legend says, turning the subsequent films on to their giggly course. When you consider how much the original Bond would have hated these small manifestations of what the world has become since 1960 or so, you might be led to suspect a furtive taking of the piss, but nothing like it occurs again, as if Gardner, not the most self-assured of writers, had repented of his daring.

Bond's second girl has the cacophonous and uncertainly suggestive name of Cedar Leiter - yes, kin to that Felix Leiter of the CIA whom sharks deprived of an arm and half a leg in Live and Let Die (1954). Cedar is his daughter, a superfluous and unprofitable device that raises the thorniest of all questions, Bond's age in 1982. Bond keeps his hands off her throughout, perhaps out of scruple but more likely because only a satyromaniac would find her appealing. She is described as short - a deadly word. An attractive girl may be small, tiny, petite, pocket-sized and such, but never short. Poor Cedar has no style of presence, no skills or accessories, no colour, no shape. And it is this wan creature whom Bond instantly accepts as his partner for the whole of the enterprise. In a Fleming novel - I nearly wrote 'in real life' - Bond would have outrun sound getting away from her. To be accurate, of course, he would have done that even if she had been Pussy Galore or Domino Vitali all over again. He knew all about the way women 'hang on to your gun-arm' and 'fog things up with sex and hurt feelings'. But then that was 1953.

Bond scores all right with the third of the present trio, Nena Bismarquer, née Blofeld and the revengeful daughter of his old enemy, a detail meant to be a stunning revelation near the end but you guess it instantly. Nena-let me find the place - Nena looks fantastic and has incredible black eyes. Her voice is low and clear, with a tantalising trace of accent. She wears exceptionally well-cut jeans and has that special poise which combines all the attributes Bond most admires in a woman. When she sees him first she gives him a smile calculated to make even the most misogynistic male buckle at the knees. As she comes closer, he feels a charge, an unmistakeable chemistry passing between them. From expressions like these you can estimate the amount of trouble Gardner has taken with the figure of Nena and indeed the general level of his performance. It remains to be said about her that she has a long, slender nose and - by nature, not surgery - only one breast, an arresting combination of defects. Nobody really cares when she gets thrown among the pythons of the bayou. Well, there are pythons on this bayou.

There are two other villains round the place about whose villainy no bones are made from the beginning, Nena's husband Markus and his boyfriend Walter Luxor. One is fat and cherubic, the other of corpse-like appearance, but neither exudes a particle of menace or looks for a moment as if he would be any trouble to kill, and Nena casually knocks them off one after the other on a late page. The three had schemed to steal the computer tapes governing America's space-satellites, having fed drugged ice-cream to the personnel in charge of them. Bond, brainwashed by other drugs into believing himself to be a US general, is at the head of the party of infiltrators, but a third set of drugs, administered by a suddenly renegade Bismarquer, brings him to himself just in time. This sounds, I know, like a renewed and more radical bid to take the piss, but seen in the context of the whole book and its genesis the absurdity, however gross, is contingent, mere blundering.

I have suggested that For Special Services has little to do with the Bond films. In one sense this is a misfortune. Those films cover up any old implausibility or inconsistency by piling one outrage on another. You start to stay to yourself. [sic] 'But he wouldn't-' or 'But they couldn't-' and before you can finish Bond is crossing the sunward side of the planet Mercury in a tropical suit or sinking a Soviet aircraft-carrier with his teeth. Hardly a page in the book would not have gone smoother for a diversion of this sort. Why, for instance, does the New York gang boss set his hoods on Bond when all he has to do is ask him nicely? The reader is offered no relief from this bafflement.

What makes Mr Gardner's book so hard to read is not so much its endlessly silly story as its desolateness, its lack of the slightest human interest or warmth. Ian Fleming himself would have conceded that he was not the greatest delineator of character; even so his people have genuine life and substance and many of them both experience and inspire feeling. So far from being 'the man who is only a silhouette' Bond is shown to be fully capable of indignation, compunction, remorse, tenderness and a protective instinct towards defenceless creatures. His girls have a liveliness, a tenacity and sometimes a claim on affection beyond the requirements of formula. Most of the Fleming books also have a more or less flamboyant figure assisting Bond and acting as a foil to him, such as Darko Kerim, the Turkish agent in From Russia, with Love, and Enrico Colombo, the virtuous black-marketeer and smuggler in 'Risico'. By a kind of tradition, however, perhaps started by Buchan with Dominck Medina in The Three Hostages, the main character-interest in this type of novel attaches to the villain. Mr Big, Hugo Drax, Dr No and their like are persons of some size and power. They are made to seem to exist in their own right, to have been operating since long before Bond crossed their paths, rather than to have been run up on the spot for him to practise on. But then to do anything like that the writer must be genuinely interested in his material.'

I think this review skirted some of the same problems, in fact (and Amis couldn't justify it face-to-face, according to Gardner). But it did still - just - play by the generally accepted rules of critical opinion. He thought the book an unrelieved disaster that brought disrepute to the name of Ian Fleming: that's an extremely critical, but perfectly valid view to express in the manner he expressed it. He found the book hard to read and 'endlessly silly' and he punctured all sorts of holes in it, as Jim has done with NEVER DREAM OF DYING. But... Jim's just some random bloke on the cybernets and Kingsley Amis was Kingsley Amis. Well, why can't the same rules apply? I think they can and do. I think Amis' piece was perhaps too crushing to be taken seriously by either Gardner or Glidrose, especially as he was the predecessor (he noted all this himself, but couldn't resist), but it does still stand as a fine, if brutal, piece of literary criticism. Jim's could have, too, but it won't because he went well over the line. What do I mean by over the line?

'I’m afraid that this background left me cold and ultimately I didn’t care very much whether or not Gilles Jacob, who rather bizarrely Bond appears to recognise despite frequent assertions that he knows little of the film “world”, gets blown up or gassed or drowned or nibbled to death or whatever it is.'

That's harsh, but not over the line at all (and in fact could almost have been written by Amis).

'On reflection, I wonder whether Mr Benson was really all that interested in this one. Not much actually happens: it is very light on action in comparison to most of his others although, to give him credit, he does appear to be wanting to try to write a love story in which Bond appears now and again but most of the investigatory leg-work is done by Rene Mathis (who must be about 254).'

That's even harsher, but it's still not over the line, in my view. If it had all been in this vein, we'd have had a very funny, rude, astute and lacerating review of this novel and some would have agreed with some points and some disagreed, but it would have been a valid review. However...

'It is, of course, reassuringly Mr Benson: the usual stuff, the standard deathly prose from the school of “oh God, why bother?”...'

'...there’s pleasing speculation to be had and imagery to brainspunk that Mr Benson was forced to emit amateur p�rn at gunpoint and this is the spill, taking the ournal out of journalism.'

'So, James Bond fingers a French fancy who then tugs away at his purple-headed womb broom. Unless, by returning the favour, she stuck a couple of fingers up his wrong ‘un and, I dunno, worked out a bit of sweetcorn or, on the basis of this rubbish, the manuscript of a book.'

It's not the rude words that bother me, before anyone jumps on that. I'm not objecting to vocabulary or style, but form. I'm objecting to the utter contempt paid to the writer supposedly being reviewed. All critical reasoning has gone out the window and it is now simply 'rubbish' to be insulted and mocked. It's not an opinion piece, or a review: it's a piss-take, and a cruel one that really has no place as a front-page article on a James Bond fan site. In my view.

Still think Jim should send his efforts (somewhere) for consideration. And then zencat can lavish his praise and someone else can take up the mantle of picking it to pieces.

Do you think that Ian Fleming Publications don't have access to the internet? The idea that they will ever hire Jim to write James Bond novels is a laughable fancy if you stop to think about it, and that's perhaps the greatest shame of this. Because if you read his James Bond novella THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, you'll see that he could have been a terrific continuation novelist.

[Loomis]

I agree with this review of FOR SPECIAL SERVICES, particularly:

What makes Mr Gardner's book so hard to read is not so much its endlessly silly story as its desolateness, its lack of the slightest human interest or warmth.

Bingo. That nails precisely why I find Gardner a great big slab of nothing.

Funnily enough, I think Benson was rather better at bringing his characters - and thus his books - to life.

As you were, gentlemen.

[Zorin Industries]

As a none-lit Bond fan (but occassional dipper in of that 'other' 007 world), I do find Benson's writing terribly underwhelming and a wee bit reminiscent of those tie-in film novelisations he steers towards.

[MkB]

Do you think that Ian Fleming Publications don't have access to the internet? The idea that they will ever hire Jim to write James Bond novels is a laughable fancy if you stop to think about it, and that's perhaps the greatest shame of this. Because if you read his James Bond novella THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, you'll see that he could have been a terrific continuation novelist.

I am sure you're rigt about IFP not likely at all to hire a FanFic writer, whatever his qualities as a writer, but I would have two questions about that...
a - Do you really think someone at IFP is in charge of reading Bond fan fictions on the net? There is such a number of them, and they are so uneven that it would be like looking for a needle in a World Wide haystack. I would thing they simply ignore the FanFics (and if I'm wrong, IFP, please have a look at my own novella )
b - But on the other hand, isn't it a little bit how R. Benson got the job in his time? I am really asking, I don't know much about this story, but since people are repeating that he was a "fanboy" (and if memory serves he worked in IT or something and was not a professional writer before Bond), I assume he comes from the same background as us?

[spynovelfan]

Do you think that Ian Fleming Publications don't have access to the internet? The idea that they will ever hire Jim to write James Bond novels is a laughable fancy if you stop to think about it, and that's perhaps the greatest shame of this. Because if you read his James Bond novella THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, you'll see that he could have been a terrific continuation novelist.

I am sure you're rigt about IFP not likely at all to hire a FanFic writer, whatever his qualities as a writer, but I would have two questions about that...

That wasn't my point. I think it's extremely unlikely - but a hell of a lot more likely than them ever hiring the author of such an article.

a - Do you really think someone at IFP is in charge of reading Bond fan fictions on the net?

No.

b - But on the other hand, isn't it a little bit how R. Benson got the job in his time? I am really asking, I don't know much about this story, but since people are repeating that he was a "fanboy" (and if memory serves he worked in IT or something and was not a professional writer before Bond), I assume he comes from the same background as us?

Well, he'd published a well-received book about James Bond.

[Simon]

Do you think that Ian Fleming Publications don't have access to the internet? The idea that they will ever hire Jim to write James Bond novels is a laughable fancy if you stop to think about it, and that's perhaps the greatest shame of this. Because if you read his James Bond novella THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, you'll see that he could have been a terrific continuation novelist.

Apologies.

Not Bond so much as original material.

[Doctor Shatterhand]

I began to read Jim's fan fiction THE HEART BLEEDS ICE and stopped after the first paragraph. He wrote:

Naples he had never cared for and, in the manner in which its persistent May rain had assaulted him as he had crossed the Piazza del Plebiscito, James Bond knew the feeling to be mutual.

'May rain had assaulted him as he had crossed the Piazza del Plebiscito'? Good grief!

If you look up the definition of assaulted it means: A violent physical or verbal attack - such as rape. Or if you have a thesaurus you'll find that it is an adjective which means robbed.

I would say that Jim has done just that to Raymond Benson. By assaulting him with verbal abuse that he now says was supposed to be funny. This could have been a constructive critique which would have opened up an intelligent discussion among other fans. Instead it is more like a colorful opus of piffle.

As for THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, most publishers would throw the story in the garbage after reading that opening line. I, for one, just clicked onto another website.

[K1Bond007]

I began to read Jim's fan fiction THE HEART BLEEDS ICE and stopped after the first paragraph. He wrote:

Naples he had never cared for and, in the manner in which its persistent May rain had assaulted him as he had crossed the Piazza del Plebiscito, James Bond knew the feeling to be mutual.

'May rain had assaulted him as he had crossed the Piazza del Plebiscito'? Good grief!

If you look up the definition of assaulted it means: A violent physical or verbal attack - such as rape. Or if you have a thesaurus you'll find that it is an adjective which means robbed.

I would say that Jim has done just that to Raymond Benson. By assaulting him with verbal abuse that he now says was supposed to be funny. This could have been a constructive critique which would have opened up an intelligent discussion among other fans. Instead it is more like a colorful opus of piffle.

As for THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, most publishers would throw the story in the garbage after reading that opening line. I, for one, just clicked onto another website.

Do you have any idea what you're talking about or are you just trying to assault Jim? Atypical usage, sure, but there's nothing wrong with it.

I'm not trying to defend him or anything. I just think you're unnecessarily trying way too damn hard to come up with something.

[Santa]

I would say that Jim has done just that to Raymond Benson. By assaulting him with verbal abuse

As you have also just done to Jim. This is a bit of a vicious circle, no?

[Trident]

Have to say, while not a native speaker myself, I still think there's nothing wrong with assaulting rain. Especially as it's supposed to be May rain, which is really a damn annoying experience in my view and more than justifies the use of 'assault' in that context.

Just my 2 cent...

[Santa]

Have to say, while not a native speaker myself, I still think there's nothing wrong with assaulting rain. Especially as it's supposed to be May rain, which is really a damn annoying experience in my view and more than justifies the use of 'assault' in that context.

Just my 2 cent...

Quite. I was also assaulted by rain just this evening.

[MkB]

I would say that Jim has done just that to Raymond Benson. By assaulting him with verbal abuse

As you have also just done to Jim. This is a bit of a vicious circle, no?

I guess that one could say:
The flaws of the "piece" are the flaws of the review. This is the structure. This is part of the joke.

[Doctor Shatterhand]

Do you have any idea what you're talking about or are you just trying to assault Jim? Atypical usage, sure, but there's nothing wrong with it.

I'm not trying to defend him or anything. I just think you're unnecessarily trying way too damn hard to come up with something.

Yes I do know what I'm talking about. The unnecessary assault to a former Bond author by another writer who thinks he is better at it.

It was not too hard to come up with my critique of Jim's opening paragraph to his fan fiction. I only had to click on the link to read it and was shocked with the description. Fleming would have rolled in his grave.

I would say that Jim has done just that to Raymond Benson. By assaulting him with verbal abuse

As you have also just done to Jim. This is a bit of a vicious circle, no?

No, not at all. Jim has raised the bar on assaulting writers and bloggers throughout CBn. My critique is not harsh at all compared to his latest opus.

[spynovelfan]

Hmm. Doctor Shatterhand, I don't much like the opening of THE HEART BLEEDS ICE, and said so in the discussion about it, but if you persevere a little you may be surprised to find an occasionally overwrought but nevertheless compelling and, frankly, astonishingly brilliant novella about James Bond.

It's all getting a bit serious, this. Look, it's not that I want to be a self-righteous bore, but I just felt there was something a bit OTT about this piece, it left a sour note, and I didn't feel comfortable keeping quiet while everyone yukked it up. I've certainly written some things in these forums that I regret (though not, I don't think, anything on the front page), and it's easy to get carried away, etc. Perhaps it's simply time to reconsider the terms and conditions of the site - apply the same standard to the front page (the most visible face to the world at large, picked up by Google News, etc) as to the forums, the same standard to published James Bond authors as to 15-year-old James Bond fans in Norway. Moderators, ask yourselves what your response would be if someone posted in a fan fiction discussion thread:

'Thanks for posting DON'T DREAM OF DIAMONDS, RacingBentley. Digressions into adult infomercials aside, there’s not much here about which to get excited or bothered about and symptomatic of this is the strange cover design you've had done by MisterAsterix, a lurid green map of Africa that very oddly deletes Equitorial Guinea entirely, and that irritates me hugely. I know one should not judge a fan fiction story by its cover (even one with “by RacingBentley” written on it) and I doubt that you had any responsibility for this, but, still, all a bit slapdash, careless, done it, over with.

There are clues that you don't appear to want to write it, I don’t really want to read it: reader and writer as one (not physically; I doubt that my orifices could cope). It’s tired. Disappointing. Building up to a climax (fnarr) that on the one hand is credible and on the other is utterly ridiculous, a shocking surprise that is neither, with the rest of it going through on cruise control, this is a go-nowhere of a story. It has some nice passages. As does the Bond girl. Oh God, will the p�rnography never end? Whilst Don't Dream of Reading wouldn’t be a fair comment, and there are worse ways to spend a few hours such as being hacked to death or Rugby League, or Rugby station, I don’t advise anyone losing too much sleep deciding whether to re-read your story. Ultimately, it exists.

Woof.'

You wouldn't let it stand, would you? So... why doesn't Raymond Benson deserve the same respect we all do? I would suggest that any comments that are of this nature, whether they are addressed to other forum members, Raymond Benson, Daniel Craig, Amy Winehouse, the Queen or in fact anyone, should be seen to be against the terms and conditions of the site. It might be a more effective way of combating the cretinous criticism of the net that Jim lamented than his piece. Please, moderators, at least think about it?

[Trident]

You wouldn't let it stand, would you? So... why doesn't Raymond Benson deserve the same respect we all do? I would suggest that any comments that are of this nature, whether they are addressed to other forum members, Raymond Benson, Daniel Craig, Amy Winehouse or the Queen, should be seen to be against the terms and conditions of the site. It might be a more effective way of combating the cretinous criticism of the net that Jim lamented than his piece. Please, moderators, at least think about it?

Would seem to me like a fair and prudent guideline. After all, it is possible, sometimes perhaps even likely, that the person in question is reading what is offered here and really is affected by it. CBn is, despite all attempts at Winehouse/QOS/Craig/etc. bashing, a remarkably civil and respectable site on the web and more than a cut above the slaughterhouse mannerism that has become the nets staple diet. In my view it's one of CBn's strong sides and makes up a good deal of its attraction. That should remain so.

[Loomis]

Taking Jim to task over misuse of the English language is a dangerous game. Besides, saying that rain cannot assault strikes me as pedantic. Whether one likes THE HEART BLEEDS ICE is another matter entirely.

And I don't think Jim needs to be censored. I make this point both as someone who doesn't want to see him censored, and as someone who has himself posted a lot of drivel on this site that may have offended others (both other users and famous names).

What's important, I think, is that everyone can have his say, and it looks to me as though that's happening.

[spynovelfan]

And I don't think Jim needs to be censored. I make this point both as someone who doesn't want to see him censored, and as someone who has himself posted a lot of drivel on this site that may have offended others (both other users and famous names).

What's important, I think, is that everyone can have his say, and it looks to me as though that's happening.

I think that's a cop-out, Loomis, sorry. Censorship? The terms of use of this site's forums say that 'Post/threads shall be edited/closed/removed' if they fall into several categories, including:

Use of bad language in posts or skirting the auto-censor by substituting letters with other characters
and
Personal insults towards members of the CBn forums or the CBn Team

There's some skirting the auto-censor in Jim's article, and perhaps there's another discussion to be had about the age of many Bond fans around the world and what impression this site wants to give them on its front page, when apparently it feels differently about these forums (why the distinction?). But it's the other point that's most obviously relevant. Jim may feel that Raymond Benson's heart wasn't in writing this novel, but I suspect Mr Benson has another view, and someone's work is a personal matter. The piece is an extended and mean-spirited put-down of another writer's work. If anyone else had posted it in the forums, it would have been edited, closed or removed - why doesn't the same apply, and why is it not permissible to insult the site's team or forum members, but it's fine to insult anyone else? I guess I just don't get that. It's a publicly accessible website.

[marktmurphy]

I began to read Jim's fan fiction THE HEART BLEEDS ICE and stopped after the first paragraph. He wrote:

Naples he had never cared for and, in the manner in which its persistent May rain had assaulted him as he had crossed the Piazza del Plebiscito, James Bond knew the feeling to be mutual.

'May rain had assaulted him as he had crossed the Piazza del Plebiscito'? Good grief!

If you look up the definition of assaulted it means: A violent physical or verbal attack - such as rape.

What a bizarre criticism. It's a little overwrought, yes, but it's perfectly servicable and uses the meaning of the word to create an impression. I'd suggest reading some more books and watching out for how authors play with language.
The Heart Bleeds Ice is absolutely cracking, although the stuff with the babies did remind me of a Sherlock Holmes story I heard on the radio a few years back which reduced its impact a little. There's a lot more to it besides that, though.

[Loomis]

If anyone else had posted it in the forums, it would have been edited, closed or removed

I suspect you're right, and the only answer I can think of is that the piece was permitted because Jim wrote it. There's probably no one else here who could have got away with it. Then again, no one else here could have written it in the first place.

Are you actually advocating that it be edited or removed, spy?

[Hitch]

As I've said until I'm blue in the face (well, it feels like it), I hope Jim's article prompts readers to buy Mr Benson's work and judge for themselves.

Though I admire - with reservations in this instance - Jim's way with words, his hard-to-miss article's conclusions and, dread word, opinions need to be challenged or backed up by reference to the text. Perhaps CBn members could then enjoy an interesting discussion of the merits of Never Dream Of Dying, the book, the whole book and nothing but the book. As a football tackle, The Impossible Job has taken man and ball, and it's not much fun seeing the stretcher come on.

Failing that, CBn might resort to a tactic that Jim himself, an excellent moderator, has used judicously in the past and close this thread before...

No, I can't resist it. You're all Nazis. Godwin's Law - it never lets me down.

[spynovelfan]

Are you actually advocating that it be edited or removed, spy?

Yes. As I think I've now made fairly clear, I feel it crosses the line from trenchant criticism to unnecessarily mean-spirited put-down, and it doesn't do anyone any favours.

But what do you think, Loomis? You said you thought it should be left 'uncensored', then agreed with me that it would have been removed if anyone else had written it but was probably permitted 'because Jim wrote it'. Do you think Jim should be immune from the principles that apply to everyone else, or not? Or are you the ex-pop star friend of Bridget Jones excited that a fight's taking place in the street? Stop watching the fight and come off the fence. The same could be said for the site's moderators, who seem content for this conversation to continue with no comment on their part, almost as though the article had nothing to do with them. Well, it does. You can put Opinion in all caps all over the place and a disclaimer that it's 'the opinion of one individual and may not represent the views of the owner or other team members of CommanderBond.net' but it does represent the site, and speak to its judgement. So perhaps you could all stop sitting on your thumbs reading each new addition to the thread, and log in and explain your decision. It would be appreciated.

[Doctor Shatterhand]

What a bizarre criticism.

Hmm, did you say the same to Jim's critique on NDOD?