Diamonds Are Forever

4-✨
What I found surprising is that Tiffany Case is a stronger female character in the book (1956) and the Wint & Kid duo are definitely not the caricatures they are in the film (1971).
A bit more realistic about spy work: not the superhero saving the world, but still risking his life infiltrating a diamond smuggler's pipeline.
People who are offended by mysoginist and racist remarks better not read these books (and be grateful they didn't live in the fifties).

Lots of action; weirdly likeable characters (including a very cool heroine)!

The most important thing to know about these James Bond novels is they are almost nothing like the movies. Bond is emo, error-prone, narcissistic, and almost always grandiose in his thinking about his skills when he is not worried about them - very very surprisingly bipolar than what the movies have primed us readers to expect. The action events in the books, which are indeed mostly copied or technologically enhanced in the movies, happens over a longer span of time. However, some novels are not at all directly copied by the movies even though the titles and some of the action scenes are. The action might be included in another movie of another name. Bond rarely is rescued in time from undergoing torture, and he has wanted to marry almost every girl who helps him throughout the assignment.

I can't help but wonder what anti-depressants and Lithium might have done for Bond's career. Maybe kill it? His psychological presentation in these novels seems like a snakepit of PTSD symptoms while at the same time Bond appears to be a poster boy for one kind of toxic masculinity. At least, that is my opinion, formed on our values in these modern times. I know other reviewers have written the same observations, too.

In 'Diamonds are Forever', written in 1956, James Bond is explicitly and unapologetically racist against Italian-Americans (he visits Las Vegas on a smuggling case in this novel). He was somewhat taken aback when he was advised by Felix Leiter after arriving in America for an earlier assignment to watch his tongue on certain subjects while in America, such as openly indulging in racial slurs against Black-Americans. I think he is surprised because he is unaware he is being racist - he thinks he is stating the obvious or well-known 'facts'. In 'Diamonds are Forever' he also is disparaging of what he thinks is a problem for 90% of Americans - they are too fat and physically weak. Americans huff and puff and find climbing a few stairs too hard in many of these books.

Basically, in the four books I have read so far in the James Bond series, he has prejudged negatively and is disgusted by what he feels defines the national character of Germans, French, Americans, Japanese, Italians and China. He also subscribes to racial/sexual prejudices about women, Black people and Asians. So far. Added to the list from this novel are obese folk. So, I was pleasantly surprised Bond and Leiter apparently are not feeling anything prejudicial against gay people beyond a comment about homosexual gangbangers as being part of a 'lavender' gang. We readers meet a couple of bad guys who are gay in this book, Winter and Kidd - very competent and scary bad guys. Bond seems to be only disgusted by Kidd because of his obesity.

To be fair (loosely utilizing the definition), when Bond works with someone who is a member of a race, sex, or foreign country he initially feels much contempt towards, he IS willing to work with people he feels are beneath him and the White upper-class men of England as an equal without open hostility. He treats criminals of a different race or nationality with apparent awareness they are skilled or dangerous despite his prejudices, even realizing sometimes his prejudices lulled him into a mistaken judgement call which nearly costs him his life or failure of his assignment.

I think Bond's racism and sexism is based on what was normal post-war English social class and educational beliefs, alongside an ignorance from a lack of extensive cultural contact outside of his social bubble. I think maybe, maybe, Fleming was intentionally focusing the character of Bond on having prejudices. I am beginning to wonder about this maybe authorial intentionality based on a subtle undertone pattern I am beginning to suss out after reading four of the books in the series. Every time Bond encounters these not-English people on these assignments, he appears to grudgingly accept this individual or that person as much more competent than he had expected. I am beginning to think author Ian Fleming was doing what many authors do - introduce and revolve plots around a character which not only does not entirely reflect his views, but is less sophisticated and knowledgeable or more exaggerated than what the author thinks. It is as if James Bond undergoes a reluctant, slow, inching-forward, slight coming-of-age in each book, noticeably a plot pattern, as I have read the series. Bond expresses his distaste for a race or nation in the early chapters, then next, after he deals with competent members of the class/race/nationality he felt were so subhuman, he is always later humbled by those folks he disparaged, inevitably needing rescue, often by an American. Did Fleming do this on purpose, or is it subconscious, because of the outcome of World War II? Was Bond more than a surface caricature sorely needed by an almost defeated nation after World War II? Was Fleming taking his country to the woodshed within a subtly satiric series about a personality type that almost destroyed Britain through arrogance and ignorance? I am starting to wonder....

Perhaps, Fleming also was undergoing a slight evolution of mind despite his upper-crust identity as his books became popular in spite of their very White post-war English viewpoint. Idk.

Whatever.

Do I really need to describe the plot of 'Diamonds are Forever'? Ok, then. Diamonds are being smuggled out of Africa. Since an English company owns the African mines, Bond is put on the case by M to find whoever is masterminding the stealing. To do this, it means he must follow the mule, or mules, carrying the diamonds secretly through international borders from Africa to England to Las Vegas in America, as it turns out. M, Bond's secret service boss, through his contacts discovers who one of the mules is, and Bond inserts himself into the mule's place in London. Bond happens to look a lot like the carrier for the diamond smuggling outfit. So, undercover, he meets the other carrier as well as card sharp, the gorgeous Tiffany Case, and the nefarious assassins Wint and Kidd, and other members of the Spangler Gang, as he tries to unmask the criminal leader of the gang known only as the mysterious 'ABC'. Of course, there is horse racing, and card games, and guns and shootings, car chases, explosions, helicopters, and martial arts, weird criminals with fetishes and ticks, and even an ocean voyage of deadly danger on the Queen Elizabeth.

There are continuing characters, so possibly readers should start with Casino Royale. But it is possible readers will not abide Bond's mild racism or the old-fashioned type of male-romance spy-thriller Fleming indulged himself in writing. It is a little bit like spending time in the company of an old White ex-military grandfather. But at least he can tell an exciting story! Have some tolerance and learn, gentle reader. This is what the 1950's were like. This is from what we all have moved on. Most of us.

Rating: 3.5* of five

Again a reminder that these reviews are for the movies by these titles, NOT Fleming's books. I wasn't at all drawn to the book I read, and I've since sampled a few others, and to me they're repellently dated.

So this 1971 outing is based on the 1956 novel, and marks the last *canonical* film Connery made. Never Say Never Again wasn't a Broccoli-produced film, and made use of a story not ever precisely made into a novel, so...

Jill St. John spends a good deal of time scantily clothed. This mildly annoyed me as she tended to drape herself over pieces of furniture I wanted to look at, and her mammary hypertrophy blocked my view of Connery once in a while.

The plot is of a ridiculousness expected from a Bond film; Bond drives a 1970 Mustang, possibly the lowest styling point that Mustang has ever hit; Charles Gray (the Criminologist from Rocky Horror Picture Show) eats up the scenery as Blofeld, the ongoing villain/nemesis; so, you know, what's expected of a Bond film viewing experience.

Shirley Bassey sings the second most-boring theme song (after Adele's dreary "Skyfall") in the canon. It amused me, mildly, and the inclusion of two gay killers was pretty hotsy-totsy stuff for 1971. So, well, it was Bond so it was better than boring; but it lacked something, so I can't give it a good rating. Just not enough SOMEthing.

Another excellent instalment in the James Bond series. I have probably read these about three times now.

Las Vegas, car chases, a train chase, a cruise ship, helicopters - "Diamonds are Forever" was excellent man fiction!

I cast Sean Connery as James Bond and Suzanne Somers as Tiffany Case! I also casted Alec Baldwin as M and Daniel Craig

After reading the first four James Bond novels, I can safely say, the Bond from the films with all his nifty gadgets and his disdain of women can be found nowhere on the pages of Fleming's books. Literary James Bond is a romantic who falls constantly in love and contemplates marriage often. He finds his job wearisome, but he is compelled to do what he must and is loyal to Q.

I love the Daniel Craig portrayal of James Bond, and I think Casino Royale was a revelation on the screen, but I also feel that if you don't read Fleming's novels, and you think of Sean Connery when you hear Bond's name, you don't know James Bond.

The blandest Bond volume I've read. Normal amounts of sexism, imperialism, and racism. Rather dull.