Customer Reviews

Thunderball

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For fans of the literary James Bond, Thunderball is one of the most pivotal works of the series. It was in Thunderball that Bond creator Ian Fleming first introduced the world to perhaps the ultimate Bond villian -- Ernest Stavro Blofeld. Though Bond and Blofeld never actually meet in Thunderball, it is in this book that Bond first battles the schemes of SPECTRE, Blofeld's criminal organization.

The plot of the book (which, as with most of Fleming's best work, is disturbing plausible) deals with SPECTRE's theft of two nuclear missiles and their attempt to blackmail the world with atomic destruction. On little more than a hunch, M (Bond's superior, as gruffly humorous as ever) sends Bond down to the Bahamas to search for the missiles. (It is made clear that other intelligence agents are combing other locations as well. One thing that sets the book apart from the film is the portrayal of James Bond as not the absolute best secret agent in the world but instead as just a hardworking professional who, often times, resents the intrusion of work on his private life.) While in the Bahamas, Bond meets the book's main villian, Emilio Largo (well characterized as an almost likeable rogue), Largo's mistress Domino (who has a nicely vulnerable speech in which she analyzes a picture on a pack of cigarettes), and old allies like Felix Leiter. Along with the usual nonstop action and the vivid descriptions that Fleming was known for, Thunderball contains some of Fleming's most memorable characterizations. While little new is revealed of Bond, Largo and Domino grab hold of the reader's imagination and linger after the end of the book.

Famously, this book was inspired by Fleming and producer Kevin McClory's attempts to launch a pre-Connery James Bond film series. The plot was invented for the movies and occasionally, the book suffers for it. The final battle between Largo and the military, for instance, reads a bit flat and doesn't carry the same charge as the earlier, less epic scenes. Surprising as it may be to some of Fleming's detractors, the writer main strength was always his ability to create compelling one-on-one scenes between Bond and the various eccentrics populating his world. And it is here that Thunderball really shines. It's too often ignored that Fleming was a witty writer whose Bond books often carried a comedy-of-manners feel. This is certainly true in the first part of the book in which Bond finds himself sent to a health salon to recover from a life of hard living. Bond's attempts to quit smoking and drinking are hilariously lampooned by Fleming, who makes little secret that he's mocking the critics who complained that his books were immoral. (Indeed, when we are first introduced to Blofeld, we are quickly informed that this man doesn't smoke, drink, rarely eats, and is apparently a virgin. In short, he lacks all of Bond's vices and, Fleming seems to suggest, turns to the business of international villiany mostly because he doesn't have much else to do.) By the time this book came out, Fleming had certainly grown as a writer from the first Bond books. Gone are the occasional awkward passages that occasionally pop up in Casino Royale. Every character speaks in his own individual voice as opposed to everyone speaking like an upper class English gentleman. In short, Thunderball is an excellent adventure that should thrill Bond fans and non-Bond fans alike.

If you've seen the movie you know the plot of Thunderball already so I won't get into that. Reading Thunderball is a great pleasure for Bond fans because the movie was so faithful to the book. There were a few things left out becuase they were considered too much for the big screen.

Ian Fleming must have had a marvelous sense of humor becuase the chapters where Bond finds himself stuck at Shrublands, drinking tea and vegatable broth and longing for spaghetti and chianti are extremely funny. Later when things get serious the reader gets wonderful scenes with M. who really was a fascinating character. The old man was even more ruthless than Bond.

The biggest thing Thunderball did was to introduce the world to Blofeld and nevermind the Austin Powers jokes, the original Blofeld was a very dangerous, very scary dude. The description of Largo and the scenes with Bond's old pal, Felix Leiter are also great.

I'm very happy that the old (real) Fleming books are being re-released in such good quality paper and with such snappy retro covers. My dad's old copies were literally crumbling whenever I touched them.

THUNDERBALL is a very interesting Ian Fleming James Bond novel. I found the first two thirds of the novel very well written. The final third of the novel seems to lose all its steam and sinks into literary mediocrity and that's what really interests me. The first third of this novel contains some of the best prose that Fleming ever put on paper. It is rich in detail and thoroughly engrossing. It is a true delight to read and savor. As the novel enters the second the third it still remains engrossing but seems to lack some of Fleming's usual drive and coherency. The final third falls below what could even be considered commonplaceness for Fleming. Fleming seems to have just given up on this project at some point and just finished it out to get it into publication. Yet THUNDERBALL remains one of my favorite Fleming novels. The first third truly is brilliant and I enjoy reading it and examining at what point Fleming became disinterested.

Many people are familiar with the films about James Bond, the British spy with the `license to kill' running around in a world of glamour and high tech toys but in reading the books you enter a whole new world. The books bring to life the times and culture of the 50's and 60's that has since faded and also have the virtue of giving the reader insight into the mind of Bond, The doubts, fears and self recriminations that film can never capture.

Both book and film start with Bond being sent to Shrublands health Clinic for a detox' program. The film makes it look like a spa. In the book the reader feels the hunger pangs of people living on a grapefruit and carrot juice diet and a small feud with a former Chinese Tong member only serves to keep Bond's wits sharp. Then the criminal organization SPECTRE plans to steal 2 nuclear weapons from the RAF and then blackmail the world into paying them $100 million dollars. On only the thinnest of leads, M send his best man to the Bahamas with the hope he can find the bombs before the deadline is reached to pay up or else.

The book and movie follow almost parallel threads with a couple of significant differences. The movie has more violence and less reason for Bond to take an interest in the villain. In the movie he has an attractive mistress and is really a creepy guy. In the book Bond has more developed reasons for looking into Emil Largo and deeper issues with why Bond can't just shoot him and go home. Reader know that Largo is the bad guy but bond doesn't and he also has to deal with the fact he might be wrong and chasing a false lead.

The book also goes into detail of the wonderful scenery of the Bahamas in the early 1960's, the land of yachts and private beaches and nightclubs that you wish you could visit today. There are also well written scenes of scuba diving and a lecture from Bond's CIA contact to a cheating bartender on the proper way to mix a drink that is sterling.

Fleming truly knew the espionage business and his books, written during the cold war, reflect this, the dark gritty world of professional thugs just behind the glittering world of jet setting millionaires and estate houses. The film has more sex and violence the book, more color and atmosphere. The film may let you see the girls in bikinis on the beach, the book with let you feel the heat of the sun and the cool of the drinks while you watch them.

After reading some of the recent works of Raymond Benson, I thought it might be fun to go back and read one of the classic 007 novels. I had never read THUNDERBALL before, but I thoroughly enjoyed both movie versions; especially "Never Say Never Again".

Thunderball is one of Fleming's best! The scuba diving battle beneath the Caribbean between Bond and Largo is epic, but the most enduring feature of the novel is it marks the first appearance of the criminal organization SPECTRE, and it's diabolical leader, Ernst Stavro Blofeld!

Did Ian Fleming have any idea how much impact this character would have on the rest literary world when he created him? Blofeld started out as just an arch rival for James Bond, but his character became the role model for all evil genius villains with megalomanical dreams of world domination!

Thunderball is a must-read for all 007 fans.

In a sense, THUNDERBALL is where it all started and where it all ended for James Bond. Although the novel was not released until 1961, it is based upon a earlier screenplay (MR. KISS-KISS BANG BANG) written by Fleming, Jack Whittingham and Kevin McClory, many elements of which were adapted for the first Bond Films.

(In)famously, McClory and Eon Productions became embroiled in an epic lawsuit that lasted decades over the rights to the intellectual property of SPECTRE and Blofeld. As a result, SPECTRE vanished from the later films, the producers decided never to follow another of Fleming's plotlines (much to the detriment of the movies), McClory was awarded partial rights to THUNDERBALL (which was remade as NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN), and Connery was wooed home for the role, a thumb in the eye of Cubby Broccoli, who had argued with Connery years before. In the end, MGM/Eon bought everybody out, this is all a footnote, and CASINO ROYALE is expected in 2006 with as yet an unnamed actor as Bond.

While not one of the best of Fleming's works, THUNDERBALL has a charming wit that makes it irresistible, especially in its earlier scenes at Shrublands the exclusive health spa where Bond is forced to go for the cure.

Fleming obviously wrote the Shrublands episode with his tongue jammed firmly into his cheek, and has a wonderful time poking fun at critics who find Bond's hedonism distressing. After two weeks of drinking wheatgrass juice and eating pine nut tofu, Bond is feeling absolutely "mahvelous," he has practically turned into "Jim-Bob Gandhi," and his Scots housekeeper May is in tears warning him against the danger of a grown man eating such "bairn's food." Bond patiently explains, with the insufferable air of a true zealot, the difference between "live" foods and "dead foods," and dismisses May with the grumbled imprecation, "Change of life."

But May is right. When called to action, Bond immediately reverts to steak and eggs, black coffee, Morland Balkan cigarettes, and whisky neat. His nemesis, Blofeld, by the way, indulges in nothing.

Not so Emilio Largo, who is a true Roman epicurean. Largo's favorite indulgences are the hydrofoil yacht Disco Volante and Domino Vitali. Bond quickly develops a fondness for the latter as well, a far more explicit fondness than the films ever could describe.

The plot is familiar to everyone who has seen the movies. (Isn't that everyone?) SPECTRE steals two atom bombs and holds the world hostage. Bond must retrieve them.

What makes THUNDERBALL the book so vastly different from THUNDERBALL/NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN is Fleming's style as an author. He is a true "sensualist" as a writer, able to pack a scene with smells, sounds, sights and textures, all while practicing an economy with words that is admirable.

While Fleming's Bond is vaguely sketched by intent, it is Fleming's language that essentially animated the "James Bond Style," far and beyond any one film. This is most evident in THUNDERBALL, the movie that became a book that became two movies. The Bond films merely solidified Fleming's prose. The cinematic Bond is a different character, but wears the same shoes.

A blasted good read!

Published in 1961, THUNDERBALL hit the bookshelves a year before Sean Connery debuted in the first film, DR. NO.

The Bond novels have always been very fluid and visual but THUNDERBALL reads as the most cinematic of the stories up to this point. That's for a very good reason: the project began as a screenplay between Ian Fleming and a producer, Kevin McClory, along with a screenwriter, Jack Whittingham. After finishing the short story collection of FOR YOUR EYES ONLY and suffering some health problems that would increase until his death, Fleming wasn't sure what to do with James Bond, especially after trying to kill him off in FROM RUSSIA, WITH LOVE several books before.

The THUNDERBALL film project appeared to be stuck in development hell, so Fleming took the script and wrote a novel from it. Which promptly put him in court with McClory for the next several years. Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, the producing team who eventually did put 007 on the silver screen, had wanted to make THUNDERBALL their first film but as the court case continued, they moved ahead with DR. NO. The case was eventually settled but probably not to many of the participant's liking since Fleming had to share the rights to THUNDERBALL and another producer outside of Broccoli & Saltzman could legally use the character (which led to the "renegade Bond film" of 1983, NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN).

The novel is fun to read because it has so many elements of what made the Sixties Bond films so much fun. A plot that involves saving the free world. The master villain Ernst Stavro Blofeld is introduced. The setting is incredibly exotic and beautiful. Domino is one of the more livelier Bond girls of the novels.

It's nice to have Felix Leiter along but...his condition after being fed to sharks in LIVE AND LET DIE stretches an already-strained believability to almost Austin Powers levels. I could accept him working for Pinkertons in DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER but to get back into the CIA for THUNDERBALL...a bit much.

From reading Fleming's biography, I thought it was interesting that he would create SPECTRE about this time, the terrorist organization introduced here. In reality, he was bored with making the Russians his baddies all the time and--I thought this was funny--Fleming believed that the Cold War would be over before he could finish writing FROM RUSSIA, WITH LOVE!

"Thunderball" introduces us to SPECTRE and its leader, Ernst Stavros Blofeld. Blofeld would become Bond's archenemy for a while, and he is certainly one of the five greatest villains James Bond has faced in his 35-year literary career. When SPECTRE steals two nuclear warheads, Her Majesty's Secret Service assigns every agent to tracking them down. Based on a personal hunch, M sends his best man (Bond, of course) to Nassau. Bond, fresh from a disastrous stay at the Shrublands health clinic, flies to Nassau to sort things out. Along with his American buddy Felix Leiter, making a most welcome return, Bond traces the danger to its source: Emilio Largo, second only to Blofeld himself in the organization SPECTRE. Bond girl Domino plays an integral role in the dissolution of SPECTRE's scheme. "Thunderball" is one of Fleming's finest novels, and it kicks off the Blofeld Trilogy, which continues in "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" and "You Only Live Twice." Top-notch work.

This is the original Thunderball novel that was based on a screenplay suggested for the first James Bond movie, and was ultimately filmed as the fourth installment of the series. It's written by Ian Fleming, but also credited to Kevin McClory and Jack Whittingham, who sued for the rights later on (all reviews should mention this fact, since McClory never let people forget it).

Like the movie Bond must travel to the Bahamas to stop SPECTRE, who have stolen two nuclear warheads. There are similarities to the book, and there are differences. The character of Fiona Volpe does not exist in the novel, nor does her sequence in the Kiss Kiss Club. Bond and Domino's first meeting is different, and Felix Leiter plays a larger role. Still readers will recognize enough key sequences in the right order to see that the film was a stronger adaptation of Fleming's work than the later movies.

It's a fast, thrilling read, and if it's fun by today's more "sophisticated" standards you can only imagine what a thrill it was back in the 60's. You can sometimes picture Sean Connery's Bond as you read, but other times this Bond is more brooding and human, more reluctant serviceman than debonair spy. What I particularly like about the novel over the book is that there's a greater sense of urgency, and that Bond is never sure if he's actually right as he follows the very circumstantial evidence. On the other hand, the movie definitely brings a greater sense of scale to the final underwater battle.

Great on it's own, or as a companion to the movie. Classic escapist reading.

This novel is a great edition to the 007 series and contains the introduction to SPECTRE and its leader, Blofeld.

After a NATO bomber armed with two nuclear warheads vanishes, the world is soon held for ransom by the evil organization SPECTRE. James Bond is assigned to Nassau and works with his old friend Felix Leiter as they find themselves on the trail of the missing bombs.

A very entertaining book and ranks pretty highly among From Russia With Love and On Her Majesty's Secret Service.