Customer Reviews

James Bond and Moonraker

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As the James Bond film series progressed, they diverged so far from the Ian Fleming books that they actually released novelizations of two of the films, both written by Christopher Wood.

Wood wrote the screenplays for THE SPY WHO LOVED ME and MOONRAKER (the two films with Jaws), and he wrote paperback novelizations for both. THE SPY WHO LOVED ME for Warner Books, and MOONRAKER for a smaller publisher, Jove. I imagine both these books are out of print now, though the original Fleming books remain in print.

Wood's novelizations are okay. They basically follow his scripts for the films, with some back story added to pad out the book. For instance, in THE SPY WHO LOVED ME we read about how Stromberg found and helped a badly injured Jaws, which is why Jaws was loyal to Stromberg. Then in MOONRAKER we read about how Jaws was upset that his new girlfriend may appear imperfect in Hugo Drax's eyes.

I guess it says something that in Wood's books, Jaws is the most memorable character. Probably because Woods created Jaws, whereas many of the other main characters were Fleming creations.

Wood's SPY WHO LOVED ME is marginally more interesting than his MOONRAKER (both the novelizations and the films). Even so, his books fall short of the Fleming originals, and are for hardcore Bond completists only.

A novelisation of a movie based on a book. Yep, that is right. This mostly follows the movie apart from a couple of small differences, and a groovy cover.

Thus, we get hijinks in space, because space adventure was seen to be cool at the time - following Roger Corman's lead.

All that aside though, the work done on this book was pretty decent. Roger Moore's version of Bond, and Jaws, so entertaining enough.

This is an outstanding novelization of the film. Christopher Wood really captures the Fleming flavor and style. I was very impressed. A must have literary work for James Bond enthusiasts.