Ian Fleming — A Life
Journalist, Wartime Intelligence Officer & The Creator of James Bond
Ian Fleming may be dead but his famous literary creation, James Bond, continues to live a full and active life, either between the covers of books, which include the 14 original novels by Fleming (which some years ago received the accolade of becoming Penguin Modern Classics), the 22 continuation novels by such distinguished writers as Kingsley Amis, John Gardner (who had already created his own hilarious secret agent, Boysie Oakes), and the Texan born writer, Raymond Benson (the author of The James Bond Bedside Companion, and the founder and Director of the Ian Fleming Foundation), plus the 7 novelizations of screenplays, mostly written by Gardner and Benson, with two early ones by Christopher Wood (who later wrote a couple of Bond screenplays). Some recent additions to this extensive publishing list are The Moneypenny Diaries, written by Dr Kate Westbrook (AKA Samantha Weinberg),and the superb “Young Bond” series of novels written by Charlie Higson. More recently, two new novels by Anthony Horowitz, Trigger Mortis, and Forever and a Day, and William Boyd’s Solo.
Apart from the books (and I haven’t even mentioned the spoof biographies of Bond, and the many biographies of Fleming) there are the ever growing number of Bond DVDs (the original videos are now very…
