Devil May Care (book)

Unlike the James Bond novels of the 80's written by John Gardner or of the 90's written by Raymond Benson, Devil May Care picks up where Ian Fleming left off, the 1960's during the height of the cold war. We find agent 007 on a three month ordered sabbatical to recoup after the events chronicled in 'The Man With The Golden Gun'. (Honestly, I thought this was already done when Kingsley Amis, writing under the pen name Robert Markham gave us  'Colonel Sun'.)  Upon completion of the three months James Bond is to make a decision on his future as a British spy. He doesn't get much of a chance to make a decision when his superior M orders him back to duty to shadow a Dr. Julius Gorner, a lord in the pharmaceutical field. Gorner's opiate derivatives have become popular in the British culture and the government believes that it is only the front to a scheme that could lead to global catastrophe.

Faulks delivers Bond with his usual creature comforts, lethal weaponry, gorgeous women, and destruction at a maximum level. Again these are elements that Fleming used very sparingly and it gave a level of amazement to the character because he was capable of turning on these talents. Faulks rams them down our throat.  The action heats up quickly in Devil May Care when an English aircraft goes missing over Iraq. These events and others lead 007 to battle for his life against a greed driven maniac who will push James Bond to his limits.

Equally genius to the James Bond character were the amazing villains he encountered.  Fleming's untoppable character development gave intriguing explanations for Dr. No, a man with metal hands, Hugo Drax, a man who wants to detonate London, sharp shooting Scaramangus who is the Man With the Golden Gun, or Auric Goldfinger who simply paints women gold.  Julius Gorner, it is pointed out to Bond by his supervisor,  should be easily recognized. One of his arms is a monkey's paw. ????  Come on, if I didn't drop the book then it was purely out of a quest to find out where we could possibly go from here.

Devil May Care will satisfy spy novel aficionados with its suspense and hard boiled espionage. While the story is engaging, Faulks is often guilty of trying too hard to capture the history of Ian Fleming. The, more than often, references to famous Bond villains and previous adventures come across forced and somewhat stale, while persistently reminding us that we are in the 1960's with references to The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. Also Faulks fails to capture the descriptive prowess of Fleming that made many of the character in the world of James Bond larger than life.

Devil May Care maybe a thrilling adventure novel, but  Sebastian Faulks is no Ian Fleming.
Please Mr. Faulks, don't write any more 007 novels.