Review : Devil May Care – Sebastian Faulks

I picked up a copy of the new James Bond book on Wednesday evening, after unfruitful trips to a couple of bookshops where it had sold out I had given up trying to find one and thought I would wait until I could get one from Amazon, but just as I walked through the train station at Paddington I spotted a couple on display at the WH Smith there (at half price – bonus!) and managed to snaffle my copy on the day of release.

Sebastian Faulks is well known for his own books, but for this one he adopts the style of Ian Fleming and produces the first new James Bond story for some years. He has done this before – in his 2006 book ‘Pistache’ he also channeled Fleming for one of his stories.

So – with Devil May Care, he once again steals Flemings pen, and with the full backing of the Fleming estate, he crafts a new Bond story.

Set in the 1960’s, and located in true Bond style – Paris, London, Persia and Russia. It describes Bond taking on another megalomaniac villain, hell bent on destroying civilisation. It is a typical ripping yarn, full of perfectly pitched references to the secret agent lifestyle (Morland cigarettes and room service Martinis), and takes you instantly back to the cold war.

Of course – there is a girl or two, and the usual characters join the fray (M, Moneypenny and Felix), but the story has an excellent echo that feels current and brings the reader back to the present day.

You can feel the ghost of Fleming in every line, Faulks recreates the style and structure of those boyhood tales. I remember reading the original James Bond stories as an early teen and this took me back to those stories and the beginning of my own relationship with Bond.

An excellent reprise of the quintessential British Hero.

sixteen

So – this was supposed to be a cool thing showing 16 random books from my website…but it broked my RSS feed, so I’m removing it till I understand what the fudge is going on!

treeware – online

We have bunches of books at home…loads and loads of dead trees stacked on neat looking shelves around the house, thanks to Sandrine we have many books in French, and I’ve always been an avid reader – so we’ve accumulated a small rain forest.

I’ve always wanted a list – mainly so I can track the books we’ve lent out to people, but also so that I can just set back and see the body that we have collected.

I stumbled across Librarything some time back – and bookmarked it so that I could come back to it in the future, but now we’ve got most of our books online.

I’m really pleased with how it looks – and we’ll be adding as we go.

Our library is here.

(Does anyone know if theres a Library thing for CD’s?)

a great one has died…

“Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies — ‘God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.’ “

God Bless You Mr Rosewater – Kurt Vonnegut – 1922 to 2007 RIP

Not so trivial

Each year, theres only one thing I really ask for at Christmas – and somehow Santa always brings it – I’m talking about my favourite book to start any year – Schotts Almanac. These amazing little collections of Trivia, Lists and other mental detritus are absolutely perfect gifts, you can dip into the book all year, or you can sit and read the whole thing in one huge info-gulp. The book is absolutely perfect if you yearn for the days of the Pears Encyclopedia that you had as a child, or if you’ve ever stood in your newsagents and wondered if buying ‘Whitakers Almanac‘ (the whole world in one book – only 80p!) would make you look a little bit insane.

Theres a fascinating interview (if a little short) with the writer (compiler?) of Schotts Almanac – Ben Schott – over at Radar. Its worth a read.

Technorati Tags: schott – almanac – 2007 – book – review
Ear Tags: I Talk Too Much by Just Jack (click for itunes links)

Holiday reading round-up : The Bloodstone Papers

The Bloodstone Papers – Glen Duncan

Glen Duncan is my favourite author – so this will only go one way, but really this is a fascinating book. Set between the 1940′s in India and present day England, Duncan tells the story of young Indian man as he grows up from a brutal school environment, through the RAF, an amateur boxing career and his first jobs on the Indian Railway. The story is being written by a young Englishman, Owen Monroe who lives in London and using this tale to tell the story of his fathers life and his fathers obsession – which stayed with him throughout his life and until he moved to England. Inevitably the stories collide, but the depth of storytelling along the way is remqarkable, and Duncans writing seems to go from strength to strength as he weaves the storylines together. Sublime stuff and really engrossing.   

Holiday Reading Round Up : ‘Non Fiction’

Non Fiction – Chuck Palahniuk

I’ve only read one book by Palahniuk before (Choke) but I picked this up as a collection of short stories sometimes suits me on holiday. This is a collection of articles and essays collected by Palahniuk over his years of writing. Stories of steroid abuse, college wrestling and a particularly good essay about submariners. Tales of encounters with Marilyn Manson and Juliette Lewis and some personal stuff about the murder of his father and the eventual trial of his fathers killer. Its engaging, and well written – highly recommended.

Holiday Reading Round Up : A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian

A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian – Marina Lewycka

I normally skip past so called ‘comedy’ novels, but the cover attracted to me to this one. The story is of an 85 year old self centred Ukranian widower living in Peterborough – who decides to marry a much younger woman from the Ukraine in a marriage of convenience. Its told from the point of view of one of two daughters who quickly discovers the truth behind the sham marriage, and involves herself in resolving the situation where she can. Its a riot – laugh out loud funny in places…and full of great scenes and dialogs between the old man, his wife and the daughter. Toshiba apples? Yes please…

Holiday reading round up : Freakonomics

I’m back! Just returned from two weeks holiday in France – and as usual for my holiday I took a pile of books to read while I was away. I’ll post some words about each of em – and you can see what kind of strangeness I’ve been reading:

Freakonomics by Levitt/Dubner

So much hype around this one – a new way of looking at the world, by numbers. I found it quite close to may way of thinking about things and how they are quite often linked by the ‘simple economics’ of the world. Some of the examples were brilliant – comparing the decline of crime in the US with the legalisation of abortion. I enjoyed this because of the simplicity to the explanations, and the good definition of causality vs correlation. Should be required reading for politicians.