James Bond: From Russia with Love

(A-) 83% | Very Good
Notes: James Bond fights the 'soft life' but ironically becomes soft: ditching sense to reattain love, adventure and friendship.

I first read this about 43 years ago when I was a 12 year old boy just starting at grammar school. 007. A beautiful Russian agent. Rosa Klebb. Red Grant. Gypsy girls fighting to the death. The Orient Express. A periscope to spy on Russian secret service meetings. Bond's briefcase. The blade in Klebb's shoe. Such iconic moments. What's not to like?

Maybe a bit dated, certainly not politically correct, but a thoroughly entertaining read.

And it brought back some lovely memories of me as a boy lying in bed and being thrilled.

I accidentally touched four stars when I intend to rate ‘From Russia with Love’ three, but I will let it stand. The action is wonderful - bombings, car chases, shootings, secret underground grotto, gypsy girl-fight with knives - and actual spying, for once, by Turks.

If you have seen the movie, you will know everything about the plot of the novel, the fifth in the James Bond series. For once, the book and the movie are very closely synced. The hot Russian babe Tatiana Romanova - innocent secretary of SMERSH, Rosa Klebb -ruthless Head of the Operations unit of SMERSH (Otdyel II), and Kronsteen - chess champion and the Head of the Planning Department of SMERSH, are all involved in a nefarious Russian Communist plot to shame James Bond by secretly filming him in a sex tape. The sight of a naked James in action shagging a Russian spy will destroy England’s Secret Service once SMERSH has made the video public, or so goes the thinking in Russia’s spy-assassination department. SMERSH is certain the morale of Bond’s fellow secret agents will plummet, and M will palm his face in shock on seeing Bond’s bobbing ass (James would be the top, naturally, I think). To add to the Secret Service’s pain, SMERSH plans to murder Bond by their best assassin, Donovan Grant, Chief Executioner, after the taping. Grant is to make the ass-asination look like a suicide, since Bond presumably will be supposedly emotionally devastated after he has deflowered Tatiana, an assumed serious and unforgivable breach of British manners for England’s upper-crust and the world. In addition, the bait used as an excuse to bring Tatiana and Bond together, a Russian cipher machine, The Spektor! will be offered up as Tatiana’s passport to defect to England. Tatiana will be given one of The Spektors, filled with explosives, to hand over to Bond once he has arrived in Istanbul, where she wants to meet him. The machine will hopefully explode once in M’s hands (M is Bond’s boss).

Gentle reader, I have no doubts now that the worldly and sophisticated author, and survivor of World War II military operations, Ian Fleming, knew he was writing books of pure silliness and farce despite their surface appearance of playing it straight. Unless any of you Goodreads members who are also British tell me different, I am assuming the Brit’s know young military men have unmarried sex, especially those Brits who are athletic adventurers traveling in Europe on the famous Orient Express. Would the reaction to a sex tape starring a handsome and virile British agent boffing a gorgeous naked woman be a source of national horror, even in 1957? Would James be stripped, so to speak, of his High Table privileges? Let me know.

Meanwhile, Fleming managed to add two more groups of people (in one stroke!) to the list of explicit prejudices the characters in the Bond novels have: intellectuals. Not because they are pointed-headed, gentle reader (pointed heads being an American slander directed at intellectuals). But because all intellectuals are gay! or so the Secret Service believes; and thus the Service rejects hiring intellectuals, especially since the Service believes the Americans will hate British intellectuals. For once, Bond protests against this prejudice, maybe because it is one he does not have very strongly? Or he thinks the benefits outweigh the negatives? Idk. Anyway, Bond appears to like intellectuals even if (or because) they are “pansies soaked in scent”. And bald. I forgot, all the acceptable intellectuals are also assumed to be only the bald gay men, rather than the long-haired gay men. Bond thinks the Americans will be good to go with the bald smelly gay men who are intellectuals, too.

Wait. Did Bond actually toss in yet another backhanded slap at Americans? After five books (start reading the series with book one, Casino Royale, if you dare) of explicit racial slurs, and name-calling and insults directed at most of the nations around the earth, I am definitely having trouble keeping up.

; p

This is my third time reading FRWL, and for some reason, my least favorite go around. The last quarter of the book is great, and throughout, you get the fantastic feeling of having an inside view of what went on in the Russian spy organization of the '50s. But it felt a little long in the tooth this time. Hurts to say those words, but am I outgrowing Fleming?

Update - I find myself re-reading the Fleming canon in order. I found it much more enjoyable this time. It's always been somewhat of an aberration because Bond is only in about half the book, but much beloved because of its many iconic scenes and settings. 4.5 stars.

I don't know why I keep being surprised that each of these James Bond books gets better than the last. Most authors get better the more they write. It must be because the movies are so stupid, so lacking in what made the books great.

007 collides with SMERSH again (that is the Russian Intelligence branch) when they send a beautiful agent to seduce him and lead him to their assassin. In fact, the first half of the book takes place in the Soviet Union, setting up the lure, Tatiana Romanova, and the assassin, Red Grant, and the caper. All of that reminded me of Red Sparrow.

Even when Bond comes on the scene, he does not do much except meet and bed Tatiana in Turkey, and accompany her on the Orient Express as they travel to London. They pass through many Balkan cities, the very ones I have been reading about in Black Lamb, Grey Falcon.

Then in the last 20 pages the trap is sprung. Of course Bond survives to die another day.

As I move through the James Bond series, I think this is the most sexist, chauvinistic. And for that, irritating. But I do find Fleming's Bond irresistible, so much more interesting that the movie heroes. This man makes mistakes that get him in trouble and others killed, he trusts when he shouldn't, and he never has all the gadgets the movies gave him. And, really, who can resist Rosa Klebb? Not his best and frustrating because of the sexism but...still a good read.

The anticipation, since the appearance of SMERSH in the first book, for a sequel is over. SMERSH (or SPECTRE as you Bond movie enthusiasts may know it) Makes a reappearance in this book. Bond is targeted and, unwittingly at first, goes toe to toe with SMERSH in their effort to corner him and execute him. It was enjoyable to see this play out.

Speaking of  Ian Fleming's writing, his characterization of evil people is somewhat strange. He ties this persons desire to kill with the 'full-moon' and seems to almost follow a deterministic philosophy with the killer's need to kill. Perhaps this is the understanding of a certain school of psychology of the time. Or maybe there is an elusive truth that I'm not aware of. Otherwise, for a book of this genera, Ian was taking a little too much artistic liberties for my tastes.

Clearly the books are dated with the sexists and somewhat racist remarks of the author. Some people are turned off by this and it ruins the whole book for them. It unfair to judge the writings of an individual who is following one of the Zeitgeists of the time. Certainly it would be better if a person is able to overtake the Zeitgeists and independently refute it all and stand on their own. But this is an almost impossible expectation for any person. A person who refutes one aspect of the Zeitgeist is almost certainly guilty of following another for better or worst.

Back to the book: So far this is the best Bond book that I have read as of yet. I have noticed his writing getting progressively better and more artistic. In this book Ian seemed to spend more time setting the scene and on characterization than in his previous ones.

Ian Fleming's 5th James Bond novel sees the Soviet organisation SMERSH engaged in a meticulous plan to assassinate the legendary British secret agent.
The plan to kill 007 takes up a large part of the novel & it's surprising how good the book is when you realise, out of the 208 pages, Bond doesn't even appear until page 78.
Fleming'e characters are as marvellous as ever & I cannot help thinking of the 1963 film version, which is perfectly cast on every level, as I read.
The latter part of the novel, set on the Orient Express as it travels across Europe, is a wonderful slice of another time & another place. I always find this section to be one of Fleming's most absorbing pieces of writing.
This is one of those books that I wish would never end.