Devil May Care
Written by one of the most admired British novelists of our time, Sebastian Faulks', Devil May Care marks the beginning of a new era for Bond. Like Fleming, Faulks' penchant for high-performance motor cars, fast women, and strong cocktails has equipped him perfectly for picking up the mantle of writing the new Bond story. And like the best of Fleming's novels, Devil May Care features the perfect mix of jeopardy, exotic locations, deadly foes and, of course, glamorous women.
3.2 out of 5 based on 10 reviews
|
Omniscore:
|
| Classification |
Fiction |
| Genre |
General Fiction, Crime, Thrillers & Mystery |
| Format |
Hardback |
| Pages |
295 |
| RRP |
£18.99 |
| Date of Publication |
May 2008 |
| ISBN |
978-0718153762 |
| Publisher |
Penguin |
| |
Written by one of the most admired British novelists of our time, Sebastian Faulks', Devil May Care marks the beginning of a new era for Bond. Like Fleming, Faulks' penchant for high-performance motor cars, fast women, and strong cocktails has equipped him perfectly for picking up the mantle of writing the new Bond story. And like the best of Fleming's novels, Devil May Care features the perfect mix of jeopardy, exotic locations, deadly foes and, of course, glamorous women.
Reviews
The Independent
Ian Thompson
“Dr Julius Gorner, a megalomaniac in the cruel lineage of Tamburlaine, plans to deluge 1960s Britain in a lethal tide of heroin. He has a horribly deformed hand and, like Goldfinger, is a refugee from the Baltic states with off-putting "Slavic features" (Faulks, to his credit, does not baulk at parodying Fleming's prejudices).”
06/06/2008
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The Daily Mail
Joseph Connolly
“It's a page-turner, and — despite a lack of frisson — the voice is largely authentic. Faulks is an excellent parodist — Devil May Care is smattered with plausible Bondisms — and a notable mimic of accent, style and nuance. The difference is, of course, that Fleming spoke the language.”
04/06/2008
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The Spectator
Charles Cumming
“With an unnervingly accurate ear for Fleming’s bracing dialogue and taut, energetic prose, Faulks has given Bond fans a hugely enjoyable entertainment, expertly paced and cleverly imagined.”
04/06/2008
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The Daily Telegraph
John Preston
“The result is infinitely better than any of the previous attempts to resurrect Bond. Apart from anything else, Faulks plainly sees Bond's contradictions”
05/06/2008
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The Sunday Times
John Dugdale
“Although not flawless, Devil May Care is intelligent, expertly plotted and engagingly playful (“I should like black pepper, cracked not ground”), and eventually finds a way to be at once a homage to Fleming and a Faulks novel.”
08/06/2008
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The Times
Peter Millar,
“The trouble with writing post-Fleming Bond is that the ersatz author has to choose how he falls between the two stools of the original books and the self-perpetuating movie franchise.”
24/04/2009
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The New York Times
Janet Maslin
“Mr. Faulks-writing-as-Fleming does not fall short of the rest of Fleming’s posthumous output. Nor does he tinker with the series’s surefire recipe for success. What he delivers is a serviceable madeleine for Bond nostalgists and a decent replica of past Bond escapades. But if you didn’t pick up “Devil May Care” convinced that Bond was an enduring pop-cultural landmark, you would not come away with that conclusion.”
28/05/2008
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The Guardian
Toby Litt
“There are points at which Faulks seems to get Bond entirely wrong. ... Sebastian Faulks can't write as Ian Fleming because he doesn't write anything like as well as Ian Fleming - not as elegantly, vividly, wittily, excitingly. It's a bad mistake because, if it weren't for this act of hubris, you'd probably say he'd pulled it off. Just.”
07/06/2008
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The Financial Times
Christopher Hitchens
“Shaky, not stirring... Fleming himself used to claim that he marched the plot along fast enough to silence all the doubts about its credibility – a guileless yet brilliant tactic. But Faulks takes fatally too long to smuggle his own effort past the customs. Except for absurd coincidences that really do stretch one’s credulity, such as Bond running into the monkey-pawed villain just before being briefed about him, everything is laboriously spelled out.”
31/05/2008
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The Scotsman
Stuart Kelly
“Each cliché is a knowing cliché, and you can feel Faulks wishing he had a licence to kill, while actually fumbling with a peashooter. The final demise of the villain is un-cinematic in its banality, but reaches for cinema tropes at the same time, a single glove floating on the Seine being the most groan-worthy... I'd prefer a Bond novel by someone who can fully ret-con the series, to use a comics term. The Fleming estate needs a Mark Millar or a Denise Mina, not a slavish ventriloquist.”
01/06/2008
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