Jul 30, 2008 05:42 PM
1075 Views
Lord almighty. Why do they have to do this to 007 all the time? Before I get down to the bottom , I Got to make one thing very clear-- I pen this review as an old fashioned & extremely loyal fan of the archetypal James Bond, & then as an avid writer & book reader and critic.
Ah so where were we?
"The Devil May Care" is the latest instalment by the franchise about another James Bond novel. The book is penned by London based
Journalist turned writer Sebastian Faulks. The book was launched in
May 2008. Of course the launch generated a lot of hope, and speculation. Keeping in mind that it comes after the Casino Royale movie. The book notched up record sales. But is sales the only
parameter to denote quality?
You never know until you've spent cash. I did. And since then I've been itching to get back. for what purpose pray? To save Bond fans from misadventure, and to save peoples' hard earned money. Now let's see.. Hmmm...
In a nut shell, the first few pages of the story starts with a lot of promise. No dearth of word wizardry and thriller trademarks. Alas! all that
fizzles out after a minutes. Mr Faulks is good with literacy skills. But he's surely not the type to be penning thriller/spy books. he has tried to imitate Fleming, and is sadly no where in the league of fellow
journalist writer Frederick Forsyth, who happens to be the big daddy of thriller writers. This is where putting Faulks on the Job of drawing Bond turns out to be more than a misadventure. Heck!
The story is set in the 60s, (makes little sense when we are warp-speeding across
the 21st century?) The right thing to do perhaps was to have portrayed a modern Bond! Faulk sets him back to a world where people have barely landed on the moon! Now that ain't fitting.
Back to the plot--A Couple of grotesque murders happen in the dingy back alleys of Paris. Drug Peddlers are killed- their tongues ripped out. Mean while Bond is facing a midlife crisis & has been let off for a career rethink by M. As 007 ponders his future (nice touch) holidaying in France ( no nothing exciting) he's recalled to investigate the purported villain - English Bred Russian James Gorner, who not only is a leading pharmaceutical tycoon but also is allegedly using that cover for peddling contraband drugs across the world. A very disappointing villain who cheats at Tennis & loathes England for reasons best known to him. The rest of the storyline (of which there's sadly very little to discuss) has 007 running around the globe with basically nothing much to do.
Accompanying him is the inevitable pretty skirt who also poses as her own imaginary twin. There's Leiter from the CIA too. The plot reeks of the 60s and one has to try very hard to get used to it. I mean you read/watch Bond with a preset notion is what I'm hinting at. Bad guy Gorner's main aim is to fly a nuke laden airplane into a Russian power plant. 007 saves the day without much of any fracas at all & gets away in an equally unconvincing manner. Well he's a portrayed as a groggy, confused aging man coping with midlife crisis! Fleming's Bond was middle aged too.But None-the-less potent. Surely not like Faulk's Bond. Here 007 looks like a hackneyed Character trading the lines of a very loosely woven & weakly conceived plot!
This Bond has no gadgets. Okay! Action is minimal and very basic. No thrills of epic proportions from the Narration.The only Bond flavor is the occasional reference by the writer to old Characters from previous episodes. Some instances have been just lifted out of previous plots and placed into this book-- Problem is, this plot does not even have the basics to incorporate those.
Bond should be Bond. Just as Sherlock Holmes should be Sherlock Holmes-- as depicted by their creators. I'm not one of those who loves to see a muscle rippling, fist flaying 007 fighting like Jet Li, or prancing about like spider man (Daniel Craig in Casino Royale) However its a book/plot we are talking here, not a movie. As a basic thriller "Devil May Care" falls absolutely flat as it has no thrilling story to tell at all. as a matter of fact, it has no story at all, and as young un's if you were in the habit of reading those Nick carter series Comics, then those filthy tales are classics compared to "Devil May Care". Boy! Am I so disappointed.
Bond sells and so I was among the Bond aficionados d to bag my copy by shelling out Rs 495. That's way too expensive for such bollocks! The packaging, covers are enticing enough. That's all.But we bought it & contributed to a record sales and setting up the mantle for Faulks. Hah!
My advice? If you get this book for free, have nothing worthwhile to do, are really desperate & are a voracious reader, you might just be able to force yourself through it.
