I gave up twice before finally reading this in whole. Unfortunately, this is not a good book. Coming of the high notes of Thunderball and On Her Majesty's Secret Service in the "Blofeld Trilogy" this hits rock bottom. The only thing compelling about this is Bond's ally Henderson. The ninja plot feels out of place and time as well as weird. No characters are interesting - who does nothing but being lead to the finale the entire book whilst sobbing over his past wife Theresa. Finally, Blofeld's plan is just bizar and not even Ian Fleming can take it this unrealisticly far. I would highly recommend you skip this and read literally any other original James Bond novel.

Forget ever James Bond movie you ever saw when you read the books. These are much more a mystery/adventure story. Recommended

I thought there was definitely an element of "I am so sick of writing these books" in this one. For example, "You want me to begin with Bond winning some sort of gambling game like in most of the other books? Fine! I'll narrate a high-stakes round of ROCK PAPER SCISSORS! Fuck you!" and "You want a death trap? Okay, how about having Bond's testicles dangle over a LIVE ACTIVE VOLCANIC GEYSER! Go to hell!" and "You want the scene where Bond instantly masters some skill that other people take years to? Okay - watch him LEARN TO WRITE HAIKU! Eat me!"

And then I looked at Wikipedia and it said that this was the second to last Bond novel Fleming wrote.

(I'm now reading the last one)

This was Ian Fleming's 11th and last novel of James Bond. Although, I've only read one Fleming novel prior to this (The Spy Who Loved Me), You Only Live Twice has a much darker theme. Its usage of black humor on politics is well-penned but a bit dull. The novel really kick-starts the thrill in the last 50 pages. The beginning is fun but the middle is boring. An espionage story with no justifiable pace at all. The Spy Who Loved Me was written in a different narrative. Still, it showed the Bond character in an intriguing light. You Only Live Twice makes the reader feel like there's no charm.

A delight. This one book is better than all pre-Craig Bond film versions combined. Do not expect a classic. It is just that my expectations were so low, and I was so delighted to read a humorous, action packed, well-paced spy novel when so many of the Bond films seem so laborious.

Written during the winter of 1963, at Ian Fleming's Goldeneye retreat in Oracabessa, on the north shore of Jamaica, "You Only Live Twice" was the author's 11th James Bond novel, not counting the short story collection "For Your Eyes Only." Ultimately released in March '64, just five months before the author's untimely demise, it was the last Bond novel to be completed. (The posthumous 007 novel "The Man With the Golden Gun" is an essentially unfinished first draft, lacking the rich detail that Fleming usually spent months adding after he got his story down on paper.) The concluding book in what has become known as The Blofeld Trilogy (started in 1961's "Thunderball," in which Bond and archvillain Ernst Stavro Blofeld never meet, and picked up in 1963's "On Her Majesty's Secret Service"), it seems to have divided fans and critics alike, primarily due to the travelogue nature of the novel's initial 2/3, and the fact that the main "action" is largely confined to the final 40 pages. Many fans, however--including this reader--find it to be one of the best of the bunch; a beautifully written book, more symbolic and nightmarish than the others, with its central theme of rebirth (Bond is essentially a new man by the book's end) a compelling one.

The novel picks up a short eight months after the tragic finale of "OHMSS," in which 007's bride of a single day, Tracy, is killed by Blofeld and his mate, the loathsome Irma Bunt. Now a broken man, in lousy health and having bungled several missions, Bond is given one last chance to make good by his chief, M. His "impossible" assignment, which it is hoped will shake him out of his malaise, is to convince Tiger Tanaka, the head of the Japanese Secret Service, to share with Britain their decoding machine only known as Magic 44. Bond travels to the Orient, gets to know Tiger for a month, and is given an assignment in exchange for the device: travel to Fukuoka, on the southern island of Kyushu, and slay Dr. Guntram Shatterhand, a botanist whose 500-acre garden, stocked with poisonous flora and fauna, has become a mecca for the suicidal. After preparing for his mission on the tiny island of Kuro, and living with Ama diving girl Kissy Suzuki, Bond infiltrates Shatterhand's compound, only to learn that the botanist, in actuality, is...well, I don't want to spoil anything, as this great novel approaches its 50th anniversary, but I DID say that this was Part 3 of the Blofeld trilogy, right?

"You Only Live Twice," of course, was the first Bond novel to be completely recast when it was released as a film in 1967. Rather than dealing with Shatterhand's suicide garden, the film has as its central concern S.P.E.C.T.R.E.'s bid to begin WW3 by hijacking manned space satellites; indeed, the only commonalities between the book and the film are the Tiger, (Australian agent) Henderson and Kissy characters (and they are completely changed and different in the film), as well as the subway office of Tanaka, the bathhouse scene in which 007's looks are altered, the ninja training school, the inclusion of piranhas and a pivoting trap floor...but everything is in a wholly different context. Don't get me wrong...I happen to love the film, and find it one of the most exciting and visually spectacular of the entire Bond series (a series that currently extends to 23 official films, as I write this), flubs and all, but always wonder how great it might have been if the producers had cleaved a lot more closely to Fleming's original conception. Bond's nighttime investigation of Shatterhand's compound is a truly nightmarish, borderline surreal set piece, and the suicide deaths that he witnesses are surely not for the squeamish; indeed, offhand, I cannot think of a more grisly sequence in Bondom, with the possible exceptions of the genital bashing that 007 undergoes in the initial novel, 1953's "Casino Royale," and perhaps the chapter entitled "The Long Scream" in 1958's "Dr. No." And speaking of that earlier torture: When Bond here learns of the sumo wrestlers' trick of tucking their genitals "up the inguinal canal" for protection, and Tiger declares "these organs...are most susceptible to torture for the extraction of information," the reader cannot help but recall that first 007 outing. "Don't I know it," Bond replies, and understandably so! Another line that made this old Bond fan (this is my third reading of "YOLT," I might add here, in a 46-year period) smile is when Kissy reveals that her pet cormorant's name is David, named after David Niven, the only man who was decent to her in Hollywood. Niven, of course, was a friend of Fleming's, and strangely enough, would go on to play Bond himself, in the 1967 spoof "Casino Royale." But all joking aside, "YOLT" is a fairly serious book, a sort of crucible for Bond that sees him emerging wholly changed. The travelogue sections are fascinating, the characters likeable (Henderson's role is MUCH larger than in the film), the "Bond girl" an appealing one, and the final confrontation between Bond and his nemesis as exciting as can be ("Die, Blofeld! Die!"). And who could ever forget the scene in which Bond is forced to sit atop an active volcanic mud geyser, as the clock ticks toward its eruption, or the three pages of details that Fleming provides dealing with Shatterhand's toxic flora, or the revealing obit that M writes in Bond's memory, or the book's wonderful final chapter, written in a style unlike anything else in Bondom, that finds the amnesiac 007 living with Kissy and desperately trying to recover his memory? The novel's last two pages aptly set up the action in the final, unfinished Bond novel, and I cannot imagine any reader not needing to know more. Abundantly showcasing what has become known as "the Fleming sweep" (the author's knack of sweeping the reader along and engendering a suspension of disbelief by the use of copious and convincing detail), the novel truly is one of the best of the Bonds. To the author, wherever he might be, goes this old fan's heartiest "domo origato"!

Not the best of 'Flemings' Bond books but still better than anything that's been written since. The plot does rely on an unbelievable coincidence but this was written a long time ago and times were simpler then. Enjoyable.

The last of the Blofeld trilogy and also the last Bond novel to be published in Fleming's lifetime. Bond's career is falling apart after the murder of his wife in the previous novel. M revokes his 00 status and assigns him to the diplomatic branch, sending him on a seemingly impossible mission to Japan, to negotiate with the head of their secret service.

Much like the end of "From Russia With Love", where Bond is supposedly fatally poisoned. This novel also builds up to the already-revealed-on-the-cover missing, presumed dead, status of Bond at the end of this novel. Let's hope he escapes this one to...

i can't even imagine why these were popular. somehow fleming manages to combine boring with implausible. maybe they were just right for their time, similar to how human sacrifice was fine for the celts. does not work today, though.

So in this book for the first time Bond travels to Japan and Fleming gets to write his thoughts about Japanese women so of course he writes like all Japanese women are slavish, submissive, but I agree that Fleming does show better understanding of Japanese customs and he treat Japan far better than he did other countries and cultures. After moving from his loss in the last book Bond is kinda lost in first few chapters but then M gives him a promotion and sends him to Japan. But like you know so far whenever M thinks of some job as peaceful it has to turn bad and bloody. And again this time too we find Blofeld the mortal enemy of Bond. And Bond vows to kill him and Does kill him, rather personally by strangling him, after all Blofeld did kill Bond's new wife within hours of their marriage. And yeah before I forget Bond becomes Ninja in this adventure and then it takes a different and bizarre turn.

So yeah now that you might have read first 11 books then pick this too and then Keep on Reading.

People who don't read generally ask me my reasons for reading. Simply put I just love reading and so to that end I have made it my motto to just Keep on Reading. I love to read everything except for Self Help books but even those once in a while. I read almost all the genre but YA, Fantasy, Biographies are the most. My favorite series is, of course, Harry Potter but then there are many more books that I just adore. I have bookcases filled with books which are waiting to be read so can't stay and spend more time in this review, so remember I loved reading this and love reading more, you should also read what you love and then just Keep on Reading.

This book was the sequel of "On Her Majesty Secret Service".
James Bond was sent by M (007's boss)to the Orient (Japan)for new assignment to meet "Tiger Tanaka".

He apparently encounter Stavro Blofeld in Kuro island........Bond's nemesis masquerading as Dr. Shatterhand whom the cause of James fiancee's death.

James Bond appropriated a revenge for this most wanted evil, genius mad who invented a new method of collecting death.

I've read some reviews of this by readers who really thought this was the worse Bond book ever. I've not read them all, but I wouldn't agree with them. However, I think I know why they are disappointed with this book. Fleming does not stick to his formula here. This is a very different book. Much the way Japan is a culture unlike our Western culture, You Only Live Twice is unlike the other Bond books. More exotic, less formulaic, with so many quirky passages. Either Fleming was working hard to add this odd feeling to the story, or he was just goofing around because he was bored with the usual plots. It doesn't matter. There is a good book here, but you have to toss aside your expectations for a James Bond novel. Allow Fleming his freedom to explore a story outside his usual pathways. It is still Bond, and it will still intrigue you. Just in a different way.
As much as I don't like reading stories about Oriental settings, I actually found this very likable. The odd way in which is it presented helps that, I think. The pedantic "teachings" of Tiger Tanaka, explaining so much of Japan and its ways to Bond, also helped a great deal. I have no idea if this was based on deep research by Fleming, or if he was making it all up. Someone from Japan could tell us, I suppose. But Fleming makes it all seem both scholarly and entertaining, and it all added to the story.
The macabre setting of the "Castle of Death" was more fairy-tale than thriller and I liked that about the book. I didn't mind a Bond book wandering into this territory. It enhanced the romantic aspects of Bond's relationship with Kissy Suzuki. In a way, the fairy-tale atmosphere made it all more believable.