35 replies to this topic

[B. Brown]

I read my first Bond novel back in 2005.

I got into the Bond films around 2000 or maybe even 1999.

Either way, I was long overdue. I wish I had started out reading the novels before seeing the films.

[Orion]

Was 2003, i was in Ediburgh with my family, they'd all gone round some exhibition and me, not wanting to go, went and bought a book from waterstoens to read. The book was Casino Royale, so choosen as id been a fan of the films since 1999 when ITV had played all of them in the weeks running up to the release of TWINE.

[Quantumofsolace007]

Why did i start reading 007


It was simple i was 13 and my mom was trying to get me into books i liked the films and mom came across Hight Time to Kill. I read it and you wanna know what I love it. Sorry but Benson is and will always be my fave post fleming novelest (though Max MCcoy who is Writing a few of the new indianna jones novels would be good for Bond because his style is similar to Benson a great solid story with tons of cool action sequences and hot girls and honestly that is what i want out of bond novel)

After pouring though all the benson novels I picked up casino Royal got half way though the first chapter and bored out of my mind stopped reading it. I was 16 at the time. Fast Foward to 2006 I was 19 (turning 20 my bday is in december) I decided i should read Casino Royale as this would be my only time i could read a flaming novel before it became a film. I read the book and loved it (btw my advice to younger fans who haven't read fleming read it in your 20's trust me)


I read all the Fleming novels and love most of them (though Sorry there isn't a single fleming novel i prefer over the film But i do think there are some exclent bits from the novels and short stories that woul.d fit the style of Craigs bond most notably the murder in the hildebrand rarity and the novel of you only live twice) After fleming I was sad as call me crazy but i like haveing a few 007 books on my to do list then i realized i could by post fleming novels used from amazon. (please don't all rush at once there are a few gardner novels i need)

So I began with Amis Colonel Sun which was a good read. then i started in Gardner territory Never send flowers was good the climax was a bit silly location wise (euro disney really Gardner) Icebreaker was ok but i felt it was too much of who was good guy and who was a bad guy going opn.

I read Faulks is novel in 08 which is was disapointed with. I honestly prefer reading asbout bond in my own time just because i can relate to him better. Maybe that is seelfishness on my part. And the fleming novels for the most part are timeless and save for a few details coukld of taken place at anypoint during the cold war. At least that is my opnion i'm sure someone will Pm me with a list of 50 idioisms that fleming used that is out of place today.

so there you hacve it. I'm hoping the next author will have bond take place in our time and maybe even do cool stories about quantum (working with the producers instead of against them) Just a day dream.

[Strangways]

The local corner cigar store also sold comic books and candy and paperbacks and everything else. While deciding to buy the latest Spiderman back in 1980, I couldn't help notice the pictures of Honey Rider and Tatiana Romanova on the covers of the Jove edition paperbacks nearby.

I bought the books, along with Goldfinger, a couple of weeks later after saving up. I started reading the books in the film order thinking that, like the films that I'd seen, they were stand-alone adventures. It was at the end of FRWL that I figured out there was a continuity; when Bond got poisoned, suddenly his return from hospital at the start of DN made sense. The rest then were read in order.

I was a little put off that the Jove editions ended with FYEO. The art was great! (The Berkley editions with only a Bond silhouette just weren't the same...) Some kid at school told the teacher I was reading a dirty book because he saw Tiffany Case in her underwear on the cover of DAF! Total 8th grade schoolyard cred!

[Loomis]

This thread asks an interesting question. For some reason, we've had plenty of "When did you read such-and-such?" threads, but never a "Why did you start?" thread.

I first started flicking through my dad's Flemings and Gardners (heaven knows why he bought them, for he was as anti-Bond as it's possible to get - the apple fell very, very far from the tree) when I was a kid, say ten or thereabouts, by which time I was already a confirmed fan of the films. "Why did you pick these books up?" you ask. Well, I'm coming to that. I was just curious, I guess.

I say I flicked through them rather than read them. I mean, I didn't read 'em cover to cover - I think I was too young to appreciate Fleming. However, I certainly sampled the goods, and I did find what I read of the books to be unique, atmospheric and memorable. Not that I finished the books, of course, but it was Fleming's descriptions and his "world" that I found interesting, rather than his plots.

I think it was when I was fifteen that I stopped just dipping my toe in Fleming and dived in. I read LIVE AND LET DIE. Yes, all of it. Why? Well, I was on holiday overseas and it was one of the few books in English available to me. I enjoyed it, but it didn't exactly turn me instantly into a frothing-at-the-mouth LitBond fiend. I was still a bit young, I think, and still too wedded to the cinematic Bond.

However, LALD did leave me with a favourable enough impression to read YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE a couple of years later. And that was it for a decade or so until, bored arseless in a hospital waiting room, I picked up the nearest book to hand, which happened to be COLONEL SUN. My dad had owned a copy, and I remembered going straight to the torture scene as a child and being horrified and spellbound by it. So I decided to read the whole thing, and was blown away by how good it was. It was not Fleming who made me a serious fan of the Bond novels - it was Amis.

By that time, I was a member of CBn of a few months' standing, and, with DIE ANOTHER DAY about to open in cinemas and my 007 fandom reaching fever pitch, I decided to read as many Bond novels as I could, if only to be able to contribute meaningfully to discussions on this site, where I saw that fellow Bond fans were still deriving bags of enjoyment from these old books from the '60s and '70s.

The rest, as they say, is history.

[Red Barchetta]

I was waiting at the airport for my upcoming 4 hour flight, and realized I hadn't brought anything to read while on the plane (yes, this was back in the day before there were laptops).
So, as I was wandering through one of those airport bookstore/newspaper stand/cheesy tourist cr*p kiosks and I saw a new Bond book by some guy named Gardner- Ice Breaker, if I remember right- and thought 'Wow! A new 007 book, and it's not by Fleming'. At this point I didn't know there were two novels that proceeded it.

I bought it, read it on the plane cover to cover twice before the plane set down!

I then found 'License Renewed', and read that whle on my trip. The day after I returned home I bought 'For Special Services'.

So, three new (for me at least) 007 novels in two weeks! It was quite a ride!!

That's the when. To answer Lommis' inquiry, I started reading Bond because I wanted to understand how Bond keeps his cool under fire, and why he's so darn attractive to women- any insite helps! LOL