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3 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
One of the Weaker in the Series, 5 Oct 2003
The sixth 007 book finds James Bond recuperating from the near-fatal events of From Russia With Love. M sends his on a seemingly easy mission to Jamaica to find out what happened to the missing station head and his secretary. As one might expect, there's more there than meets the eye, and Bond ends up facing off with one of the more memorable villains of the series. Soon after arriving, Bond's cover is blown and an attempt is made on his life, which is easily traced back to the mysterious guano magnate, Dr. Julius No. Bond teams up with his old pal Quarrel to infiltrate No's private island and poke about. As per usual, it's not long before Bond comes across a beautiful wild girl who will be at his side the rest of the story and end up in his bed. Honey is a truly ridiculous character, part untamed Amazon, part innocent schoolgirl, part nubile supermodel, all male fantasy (more so than usual, even for the Bond books!).Once the dynamic trio is teamed up, it's not long before they're bumbling their way into the arms of Dr. No's professional henchmen. Bond makes elementary mistake after mistake, achieving something along the lines of his own personal Bay of Pigs in the showdown with the dreaded "dragon". Once in the (inevitable) clutches of the hook-handed Dr. No, things get even more silly. First, the villain reveals his entire nefarious operation to Bond (because he's an egomaniac and needs his audience), which Bond had no previous idea about. Then, after gleefully telling Bond and the girl about how he liked to conduct scientific tests of human "will to live", and conveying them to his own deadly obstacle course, he doesn't even bother to observe his little experiment! Instead, he wanders off to supervise some guano loading operation! This, of course, leaves Bond free to devise an escape (after a particularly groan-inducing battle with a giant octopus), and take revenge in a scene is so bad that it's unintentionally funny. In the end, this is one adventure where Bond's toughness proves more useful than any brains r training. The descriptive writing is quite good, as Fleming places the reader right into the pristine beaches, smoky nightclubs, and fetid swamps. But it's a shame the plotting and internal logic wasn't tightened up, and the the supporting cast wasn't a bit more interesting. Quarrel is a stereotypically drawn islander, rough, tough, and lovin' the ladies, while Honey is a walking fantasy who has Bond swinging back and forth between father-figure and sexual instructor. One of the weaker books in the series.
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by Ian Fleming
by Ian Fleming
by Ian Fleming
by Ian Fleming
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