2121 replies to this topic

[clublos]

This is new. In all the JD interviews I've read (and there have been alot!), this is the first mention of who he used as his model for Bond.

http://www.thebookbo...james-bond.html

I recall hearing this, perhaps it was in his NPR interview?

[Dell Deaton]

This is new. In all the JD interviews I've read (and there have been alot!), this is the first mention of who he used as his model for Bond.

http://www.thebookbo...james-bond.html

Rather than repeat what I just wrote on your Blog, I believe this reference has been around for quite a while. It was certainly a significant part of the comments Jeffery Deaver made at the Simon & Schuster VIP launch party in New York City on June 14.

[zencat]

U.S. paperback in April 2012.

http://www.thebookbo...eing-april.html

[marktmurphy]

This is new. In all the JD interviews I've read (and there have been alot!), this is the first mention of who he used as his model for Bond.

http://www.thebookbo...james-bond.html

A friend of mine says he can't help but picture Bear Grylls as Bond in it, which I can't disagree with!

[TheREAL008]

Bear would make a fantastic Bond.

[Jump James]

Is it just me who finds it strange that this new Bond we got was based on Hoagy Carmichael who Fleming had in mind back in the 1950s when brilocream and a sharp crease in ones trousers was compulsory ? People don't look like that now, so why use it as a visual guide for rebooted Bond?

[MkB]

Is it just me who finds it strange that this new Bond we got was based on Hoagy Carmichael who Fleming had in mind back in the 1950s when brilocream and a sharp crease in ones trousers was compulsory ? People don't look like that now, so why use it as a visual guide for rebooted Bond?

Yeah, well, I have never been enthralled by the idea of Bond as a Hoagy Carmichael lookalike. Not necessary, really.
BTW, isn't there a line in FRWL (if memory serves), about Bond not using brilocream-like stuff?

[OmarB]

Is it just me who finds it strange that this new Bond we got was based on Hoagy Carmichael who Fleming had in mind back in the 1950s when brilocream and a sharp crease in ones trousers was compulsory ? People don't look like that now, so why use it as a visual guide for rebooted Bond?

Physically looking like Hoagy doesn't mean he's gonna wear brilcream and sharp creases. I look like my grandfather but I don't dress like him, heck I have long hair which he never would have.

[Jump James]

Is it just me who finds it strange that this new Bond we got was based on Hoagy Carmichael who Fleming had in mind back in the 1950s when brilocream and a sharp crease in ones trousers was compulsory ? People don't look like that now, so why use it as a visual guide for rebooted Bond?

Physically looking like Hoagy doesn't mean he's gonna wear brilcream and sharp creases. I look like my grandfather but I don't dress like him, heck I have long hair which he never would have.

Physically Hoagy looks like a creature of his times. Ok take away the slicked back hair and 50s clothes and how would he look in today's world? I don't think he fits the bill in 2011. Why go back to Fleming but not write about Flemings Bond?

[Santa]

Is it just me then who thinks (rather uncharitably) that Deaver slung the Hoagy reference in just to show he´d done his research on Fleming?

[Dustin]

Is it just me then who thinks (rather uncharitably) that Deaver slung the Hoagy reference in just to show he´d done his research on Fleming?

Saddens me to say, that's what I think too. It's entirely off, especially considering how the whole of Carte Blanche is desperately crammed with up-to-date references where the one to an obscure singer and composer (who wasn't even that much of a celebrity in his time) sticks out like a sore thumb. Nobody but a dedicated jazz aficionado or a Bond fan today would even know who Carmichael was.

IIRC there's also a reference to the times of Bentley's racing days - before the marque even was sold to Rolls Royce. It's likewise odd and really only there for the benefit of the Fleming-Bond fans and the Bentley owners amongst the readers.

[OmarB]

Is it just me who finds it strange that this new Bond we got was based on Hoagy Carmichael who Fleming had in mind back in the 1950s when brilocream and a sharp crease in ones trousers was compulsory ? People don't look like that now, so why use it as a visual guide for rebooted Bond?

Physically looking like Hoagy doesn't mean he's gonna wear brilcream and sharp creases. I look like my grandfather but I don't dress like him, heck I have long hair which he never would have.

Physically Hoagy looks like a creature of his times. Ok take away the slicked back hair and 50s clothes and how would he look in today's world? I don't think he fits the bill in 2011. Why go back to Fleming but not write about Flemings Bond?

You can't characherize a person's face as "period" man. A person looks like what they look like, regardless of the era if you don't take into acount prevailing fashion trends and hairstyles. As I said, I look like my grandfather but I don't dress or wear my hair like him and my face is not a 40's or 50's face.

[Jump James]

You can. Evolution man. Besides peoples mouths were a lot crueler looking in the 50s, just read Fleming.

Edited by Jump James, 18 July 2011 - 04:36 AM.

[Righty007]

You can. Evolution man. Besides peoples mouths were a lot crueler looking in the 50s, just read Fleming.

You're ridiculous.

[Santa]

I was not impressed with Carte Blanche as a Bond novel but it has had the rather pleasant side effect of completely reviving my interest in Bond. I hadn´t gone off Bond in the meantime, it had just taken a back seat. I haven´t really bothered to read the books or watch the films much the past year, nor to post at CB.n - things which have been part of my daily life for a long time now. I knew it would all come back in time, you can´t break the habit of a lifetime that easily, but suddenly I can´t get enough Bond again. For that, if nothing else, I can appreciate CB.

[zencat]

U.S. paperback now set for Jan 24.

http://www.thebookbo...ow-set-for.html

[F. Leiter]

U.S. paperback now set for Jan 24.

http://www.thebookbo...ow-set-for.html

Great news! Hopefully they give us better cover art this time around...

[zencat]

News on two UK paperbacks.

http://www.thebookbo...paperbacks.html

[Simon]

Is it worth someone at Cbn to change the Project X link at the top of the main page to erm, well, Carte Blanche?

Not sure how relevant that is now that Carte Blanche has all but eventuated into the history books.

[OmarB]

Nah, I say leave it as it is. Project X is more than just CB, it's the whole new timeline/universe that started in CB. Now, if it never gets past CB like the whole Amis thing then you have something.

[zencat]

U.S. paperback cover art:

http://www.thebookbo...te-blanche.html

[Simon]

Which is just as awful now as it was then.

Hoping for better from the UK paperback - and the purchase of this will be when I read CB for the first time.

[DamnCoffee]

Started listening to the audio book of this last night, since I got all the Harry Potters out of the way. I'm up to Chapter 8, now. Kinda can't take it seriously cause Toby Stephens is reading it. I keep expecting him to randomly say "Oh look. PARACHUTES FOR THE BOTH OF US. WHOOPS. NOT ANY MORE!"

In all seriousness though, I am enjoying it. So far, I think Deaver has got the Bond character spot on. I'm loving the little glimpses into his private life. What razor he uses, that breakfast is his favourite meal of the day etc. Loving it a lot.

Good stuff so far. I'm looking forward to going back and listening to all the audio books. The literary Bond is probably my weakest medium of the Bond universe.

[Jeff007]

I had heard him playing James Bond in the BBC adaptations of Dr. No and Goldfinger so it wasn't that hard to hear him in the audio book. I think he does a decent job. You'll enjoy the rest of your listening.

[DamnCoffee]

Listening to a few chapters in bed on a night. Just got past Bond and Philly's dinner. Brilliant stuff so far, loving it.

[Jim]

I woke up this morning and realised I could remember nearly damn all about it, six months or so on. The only things that seem to stick are:-

- Bond being a colossal know-all, and terribly well scrubbed and naice and, accordingly, loathsome and boring
- a neat trick with a Mini and a Bentley although now I know that trick's there any perception of suspense on re-reading evaporates
- something to do with fingernails
- something to do with nailbombing a post-1992 university that no-one would go to anyway
- something to do with a coat hanging off a mountain although now I know that trick's there any perception of suspense on re-reading evaporates
- something to do with some foreign aid or summat

I might be exaggerating but I fear that I'm not. And, with little or no news of any sort of follow-up, I am tempted to ask - what the hell was the point of all that, then? Apart from the money, which is a good enough reason I guess.

[dlb007]

Jim,

That seems to be most of what I can remember as well. It's certainly one of the least memorable Bond novels ever written.

[Dustin]

I envy everybody who got any much enjoyment out of CARTE BLANCHE. To me it felt like a tv series episode that's mainly 'filler' to complete the season. To me it has a somewhat foamy quality, more volume than the actual substance would call for. After consumption I felt a slight urge to burp.

The point? Well, at first I was convinced there must be one, especially so since a reboot was announced with great furore. I suspected some greater idea, a broader concept that justified such bold decisions and really called for a different take on Bond, one step (or two) removed from the source. But what we got instead could just as well have worked within the traditional series; even as a direct continuation from Gardner, with whose concept for the last two books Deaver's own shares more than with the original in my view. The one thing that's truly 'new' to Bond in CARTE BLANCHE is the subplot about his parents, a somewhat forced idea that unfortunately cannot even claim originality. The only thing more awful would have been M saying 'Luke, I am your father!' (I know that's the wrong quote). That could at least have been funny, the spy parents killed by the KGB are not.

All in all I feel I could have read something more worthwhile in the time I spent reading CARTE BLANCHE. I just started SATORI, Don Winsolw's prequel/midquel to SHIBUMI. I'm only 120 pages in so far, but have already gotten several times the entertainment value I got out of Deaver's book. I've read a lot of Bond in my time, all Flemings and most of the continuations several times. But at the moment I don't really feel a need to read more of this rebooted series. If future books - should there really be further entries, which the present silence doesn't exactly suggest (amazon ratings are two-and-a-half to three stars, not exactly raving) - aren't substantially different, no, if future books aren't vastly superior to this, well, then I don't think I will go to the trouble of reading them. I am a fan of Bond, especially the literary variant. But I won't waste my time with average or below thrillers, when there are countless better ones out there that just don't have a character called Bond in them. Life is much shorter than we usually think, we should use our time.

[Simon]

After consumption I felt a slight urge to burp.

Marvellously funny.

I feel even better about having delayed my 'consumption' until the furore and thus, expectation, has died. I hope it will appeal a little more without the attendant buzz.

That said, while I too find I am reading some slightly weightier books, a sense of completism will make me read this.

[glidrose]

CB is awful. At least what I read of it. I stopped one quarter of the way in. I read a detailed plot synopsis for the rest. I know. Not very sporting of me. The pages were made of cement. I struggled not to skim the pages. The book is padded and overwritten. Deaver writes anaemic prose. A computer could have churned it out. I enjoyed an early Deaver book called "Garden of Beasts" and had high hopes for CB. The protagonist in that other book was far more like Bond than this hollow contraption. A 30 year old Bond does not work for me at all. I will say that despite its many flaws and failings, Faulks' attempt was far better. Unlike the film Bond, I'm not sure the book Bond works in our age. Better to write period tales up to and including the 1970's. Count me among those who say no American should write the book Bond. Brits only. And only Brits who write like Brits. None of this modern trans-Atlantic prose.

Jeffery Deaver is the Lawrence Sanders of our age. When Deaver passes on, his books will go out of print and he will be forgotten. There, I said it.

Edited by glidrose, 26 October 2011 - 06:28 PM.