On NPR this morning: a good if short interview with British author Sebastian Faulks, who has just published a new James Bond book. 
Faulks, whose novel Engleby drew raves last year and just came out in paperback, wrote Devil May Care as a tribute to the 100th anniversary of Bond creator Ian Fleming's birth.
Click here to hear the interview and read a short excerpt from the book.
Fleming, who died in 1964, was also responsible for the children's classic Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, which was my favorite movie when I was about 7 (liked the book, too).
I read most of the Ian Fleming Bond books and really liked the vintage covers used on the paperback reissued series some years back.
The books were drastically different from the movies, in most cases. The last 007 film "Casino Royale" surprisingly followed the book pretty well, including its infamous torture scene, but some of the others bore no resemblance whatsoever. Especially "The Spy Who Loved Me." As I recall, Fleming's story focused on Bond holed up in a cabin in the woods with some chick and some bad guys were after the woman. (Read it so long ago all I can remember is the cover and some basic premise). The book had nothing to do with the movie's story of a Russian spy and a 7-foot bad guy named Jaws.
Reportedly, JFK was a huge fan of Fleming's Bond books, especially From Russia With Love, if I'm not mistaken.
Posted by: HoCo | May 28, 2008 at 03:23 PM
Someone recently told me - so I have no idea if it's true or not - that the Fleming books weren't big sellers when they came out, that Bond became Bondish because of the popularity of the movies...
Posted by: Connie | May 28, 2008 at 04:10 PM
That is true. Bond books had cult following but the movies became massive pop culture smashes.
Posted by: HoCo | May 29, 2008 at 01:34 PM