Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required. Learn more
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle Cloud Reader.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
Casino Royale (James Bond (Original Series)) Paperback – October 16, 2012
| Ian Fleming (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
| Price | New from | Used from |
|
Audible Audiobook, Unabridged
"Please retry" |
$0.00
| Free with your Audible trial | |
|
Mass Market Paperback
"Please retry" | $17.48 | $1.90 |
|
Audio CD, Audiobook, CD, Unabridged
"Please retry" | $16.21 | $15.00 |
|
Board book
"Please retry" |
—
| — | $45.28 |
- Kindle
$10.99 Read with Our Free App -
Audiobook
$0.00 Free with your Audible trial - Hardcover
$49.995 Used from $37.00 8 New from $35.04 - Paperback
$10.9953 Used from $2.96 3 New from $10.99 - Mass Market Paperback
$22.0369 Used from $1.90 6 New from $17.48 1 Collectible from $35.11 - Audio CD
$16.211 Used from $15.00 2 New from $16.21 - Board book
from $45.281 Used from $45.28
Enhance your purchase
In the novel that introduced James Bond to the world, Ian Fleming’s agent 007 is dispatched to a French casino in Royale-les-Eaux. His mission? Bankrupt a ruthless Russian agent who’s been on a bad luck streak at the baccarat table.
One of SMERSH’s most deadly operatives, the man known only as “Le Chiffre,” has been a prime target of the British Secret Service for years. If Bond can wipe out his bankroll, Le Chiffre will likely be “retired” by his paymasters in Moscow. But what if the cards won’t cooperate? After a brutal night at the gaming tables, Bond soon finds himself dodging would-be assassins, fighting off brutal torturers, and going all-in to save the life of his beautiful female counterpart, Vesper Lynd.
Taut, tense, and effortlessly stylish, Ian Fleming’s inaugural James Bond adventure has all the hallmarks that made the series a touchstone for a generation of readers.
The text in this edition has been restored by the Fleming family company Ian Fleming Publications, to reflect the work as it was originally published.
- Print length188 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Publication dateOctober 16, 2012
- Dimensions5.5 x 1 x 8.25 inches
- ISBN-101612185436
- ISBN-13978-1612185439
Customers who viewed this item also viewed
Editorial Reviews
Review
“A superb gambling scene, a torture scene which still haunts me, and, of course, a beautiful girl.” ―Raymond Chandler
“Casino Royale introduces a brand-new mystery writer, Briton Ian Fleming, and a hard-shelled British secret-service operative, James Bond, who should be prowling the international underground for some books to come.” ―Time
“The first part of the book is a brilliant novelette in itself, dealing with the unlikely but imaginative plot to ruin a Communist agent by gambling against him for high stakes.” ―The New York Times
“A first-rate thriller…with a breathtaking plot.” ―The Manchester Guardian
“An extremely engaging affair…exciting and extremely civilized.” ―The Times Literary Supplement
“Ian Fleming writes with a kind of pushing, bloodcurdling elegance. His thrillers are models of fastidious murder.” ―The New York Times
“Fleming is intensely observant, acutely literate and can turn a cliché into a silk purse with astute alchemy.” ―The New York Herald Tribune
“Fleming could write about a stroke in golf, a finesse in bridge, or the engine of a Lancia Flaminia Zagato Spyder the way John Updike can write about copulation: endlessly, and amazingly, entertainingly.” ―New York magazine
“Mr. Fleming is in a class by himself.” ―The Daily Mail
“It is hard to overestimate the effect James Bond had on post-war readers and audiences.” ―Christopher Fowler, The Independent on Sunday
“Ian Fleming…combines the more sensational features of American gangster fiction with a high degree of literacy and genuine sophistication; then he presents his whole sleek creation with a cosmopolitan flourish.” ―Tablet
“James Bond is a literary brand name par excellence.” ―Robert McCrum, The Observer
About the Author
Ian Fleming was born in London on May 28, 1908. He was educated at Eton College and later spent a formative period studying languages in Europe. His first job was with Reuters News Agency where a Moscow posting gave him firsthand experience with what would become his literary bête noire―the Soviet Union. During World War II he served as Assistant to the Director of Naval Intelligence and played a key role in Allied espionage operations.
After the war he worked as foreign manager of the Sunday Times, a job that allowed him to spend two months each year in Jamaica. Here, in 1952, at his home “Goldeneye,” he wrote a book called Casino Royale―and James Bond was born. The first print run sold out within a month. For the next twelve years Fleming produced a novel a year featuring Special Agent 007, the most famous spy of the century. His travels, interests, and wartime experience lent authority to everything he wrote. Raymond Chandler described him as “the most forceful and driving writer of thrillers in England.” Sales soared when President Kennedy named the fifth title, From Russia With Love, one of his favorite books. The Bond novels have sold more than one hundred million copies worldwide, boosted by the hugely successful film franchise that began in 1962 with the release of Dr. No.
He married Anne Rothermere in 1952. His story about a magical car, written in 1961 for their only son Caspar, went on to become the well-loved novel and film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Fleming died of heart failure on August 12, 1964, at the age of fifty-six.
Learn more about Ian Fleming at www.ianfleming.com.
Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.
Product details
- Publisher : Thomas & Mercer; Reprint edition (October 16, 2012)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 188 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1612185436
- ISBN-13 : 978-1612185439
- Item Weight : 3.2 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 1 x 8.25 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #21,008 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #614 in Espionage Thrillers (Books)
- #1,810 in Murder Thrillers
- #2,820 in Reference (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the authors

Formerly a crime reporter, Van Jensen is now a leading writer of comic books, working on iconic characters including The Flash, Green Lantern, Superman and James Bond. He has also created much-praised original books including Cryptocracy (Dark Horse) and Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer (Top Shelf/IDW). Jensen's latest graphic novel, Two Dead (Gallery 13/Simon & Schuster) is inspired by a true crime and was a Booklist top 10 graphic novel. Jensen has been called a "comics polymath," and he previously served as a Comic Book Ambassador for the U.S. State Department. Jensen was born and raised in a village in Western Nebraska. He lives with his family in Atlanta. www.vanjensen.com

Ian Fleming was a British author and journalist. His first novel, Casino Royale (1953), introduced spy hero, James Bond, agent 007, to the world. It was the first of fourteen James Bond books which have gone on to sell over 60 million copies worldwide and be translated into 20 languages. Beginning with the movie adaptation of Dr No in 1961, the series also sparked the longest-running film franchise in history. Both Fleming and his fictional counterpart have become synonymous with style, glamour and thrilling adventures, as well as universally recognised phrases such as “My name’s Bond, James Bond” and “shaken and not stirred”.
Fleming was born in London in 1908. In the 1930s he worked at Reuters news agency before joining Naval Intelligence as an officer during the Second World War. His talent for writing fast and engaging prose, along with his knowledge of espionage and his fertile imagination led to the creation of James Bond, arguably one of the most-famous fictional characters of all time. He also wrote children’s classic Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Fleming was married to Ann Rothermere with whom he had a son, Caspar. He died in 1964.
Customer reviews
Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.
To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.
Learn more how customers reviews work on AmazonTop reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
Written during the height of the Cold War, Fleming's Bond novels were based on actual people and operations that Fleming had first hand knowledge of because of his highly placed role in British Naval Intelligence during WW II.
Rather than judge Casino Royale, or any of Fleming's Bond novels, by what you've seen in the movies, instead first learn about the real Operation Goldeneye; the real Operation Tracer; the real Operation Ruthless; the real No. 30 Commando Unit; the real Special Operations Executive; the real 10th Light Flotilla; the real "Smyert Shpionam"; the real Dusko Popov. The tradecraft, operations, units, events, and involved individuals were the very real WW II sources that Ian Fleming used in creating Bond and the world in which he moved. In chapter four of "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy", John Le Carre also alludes to a small group similar to Fleming's 00s as: "...about a dozen men, they worked solo, there to handle the hit-and-run jobs that were too risky" for Secret Intelligence Service agents stationed abroad.
Fleming's romanticized works have a ring of authenticity recognizable to anyone familiar with or who may have participated in events that occurred during those times. Read Casino Royale; travel back to a time when French was the only international language; a time when Joseph Stalin and the Soviet NKVD represented a very real threat; a time when people feared that threat; and a time when the governments of the Free World had very real people on the payroll like Fleming's fictional James Bond to counter that threat. Perhaps you'll see the same things in it that caused the first three printings to sell out quickly in the U.K., and that later made it a favorite of a Harvard graduate who happened also to be President of the United States.
At the time of Casino Royale (1951), Bond is about 30 years old and has held the 00 number for about six months. He earns the U.S. equivalent of about $5,600 annually (or about $50,000 in 2016 value), and drives a supercharged 1930 Bentley coupe that can reach 100 mph on a good day.
He spends what he earns. He knows that statistically he will have at least 10, probably 20, and as many as 30 very tough assignments before the mandatory 00 retirement age of 45. Too many. He knows the odds of his surviving the coming ten years are slim to none. And that depresses him. How do I know? Ian Fleming tells us so in Chapter One of "Moonraker" (third book in the series).
That's the Bond that Ian Fleming created. Much more interesting and gritty and real and human. That's the Bond Sean Connery portrayed until the Hollywood idiots ran amok after Goldfinger. It's the Bond Daniel Craig resurrected until the new crop of Hollywood fools screwed it up again with November 2015's Spectre.
I'll stick with the books, thank you very much!
Fleming's writing style, while perhaps not rising to the expectations of modern pedantic poseur literary critics, is easy to read and follow. As would be expected from a successful journalist writing for educated U.K. citizens of the 1950s, his audience would have been quite comfortable with his style; his adding color by use of some French terms and phrases in a novel that, after all, takes place in France; and whom would not have needed sub-titles to understand their context. I didn't find that aspect disruptive at all to the flow of the narrative.
If you want entertaining glitz, stick with the movies; if want something more, read the books! I've enjoyed them all immensely in the context of the time period in which they take place.
Bond fans may want to check out flemingsbond.com, a treasure trove of factual information upon which Fleming relied in writing the Bond novels, and "Ian Fleming's James Bond: Annotations and Chronologies" by John Griswald.
Top reviews from other countries
This is a book that I first read many years ago and was one that I decided to read again, remembering just how much I loved the Bond books and, of course, to look at through more world-weary eyes.
It seemed to start a bit jerkily as though Fleming was coming to terms with his writing, but it smoothed as it went along. I’ve seen various things written about the book, decrying it for vulgar sexism (it is sexist but I did not think it was as bad as some people have declared), that it goes into far too much detail about the culture of casinos and gambling (not as much as I thought it would and what there was seemed interesting) and that Bond is not the clear-cut hero his modern image shows, in fact he is a bit of a bastard. (He is).
For me the book was an excellent read, and rather than looking at it through modern eyes with modern sensibilities I tried to look at it as it was written, a contemporary piece that has, by the passage of time, become a period piece. It is a rather interesting look at another time, when the memories of war were that more immediate, where the men had been shaped by that conflict, when sexism was just part of the culture, a good decade off from really starting to change although the seeds are being sown. (I’d imagine Fleming would have been against this.)
In short it is a snapshot of a time and place that has long gone, where casinos are no longer exotic places – the big ones probably still are, but they have been diluted through depiction by film and TV, and by the more commercial ones that appear on streets.
The core of the story is a strong one though, something that can be attested to by the more recent movie of the same name. Cleverly the writers of that have kept the main beats and plot points in place, and updated them for a modern audience.
The novel deals with something that is in some ways simple, but as with most things, simple works best. An agent of a foreign power has squandered funds he should not have done and is trying to recoup that loss through card play. The ‘good’ powers are determined to exploit this weakness and send Bond along to break Le Chiffre.
It is a rollercoaster of a ride, with the baccarat part of the novel written well enough that you can follow how the game works, and causing tension to build nicely as the cards are played. It is what happens after that steals the book though, with a damaged and somewhat cornered animal striking out, but even this does not deal with the increasing twists that just keep coming.
It is an old-world story, that catches the feel of its era. Everyone smokes heavily, there is a sense of style that is part of that bygone era.
Bond himself is not a particularly likeable character. He treats women with the sort of contempt that today would be totally unacceptable – at one point basically saying that they should be in the kitchen and house. He is brutal, a shark swimming through a sea of lesser beings. It is only as the book progresses that we see him soften and almost become likeable. This could, of course, be a reaction to the torture he suffers, but all the same it is this humanising of his character that gave him the potential to become the cultural icon he has.
On a final note, there is perhaps a sense of justice, in for all his attitude towards women, that virtually all the men miss the fact that the best spy among them is not male.
Overall well worth a re-read.
I find them addictive. The prose is first class. The baddies are bad the goodies are good.
each time I read them as I get older something different appeals.
This time the subtlety of this book has really got into me.
I find it possible to live in the moment as the story goes along. I'm there in the casino, chasing down the coast road, experiencing the bomb going off, imagining the hotels and on and on.
Here surely is genius. I read a lot, all sorts of stuff. Rarely does an author do this. John Steinbeck does it. There are a few others but they are a rare breed.
Live and let die next. Thank you Ian Fleming for a lifetime of pleasure.
I fully admit I went into this with preconceived ideas on Bond. I assumed I'd be in a maze of misogyny, pumped up males at every turn saving us damsels in distress however I wasn't entirely right on those ideas.
Yes there a lot of misogyny here but having gone into the book expecting it, it didn't bother me half as much and honestly it was written in 1953, if I was written more recently I'd be mad but 1953, I'm not here to fight the battles of the past.
You can very much tell that not only are the male characters misogynistic, the authorial voice is also. One particular scene made me howl with laughter. When Bond takes a woman back to his hotel room, Bond mentions that he has some things to lock in the safe in another room and Vesper (the woman he met that night) says ..... she will tidy up while she waits. Tidy up! What a line!
And yes there are a lot of pumped up males here blowing their own trumpets.
HOWEVER I did not expect Bond to be such an air head. He's a pretty boy, easily fooled and totally unaware that a female could out smart him. I guess I expected him to be smarter, more savvy, more aware (I mean he's a spy right!).
This is book one in a thirteen (?) book series so I'm looking forward to see how Bond's character grows.
This book hasn't aged well but I think if you go into it knowing that you may enjoy it more and I do appreciate what this author did for the spy genre overall.
Three stars.
First off, I am seeing a lot of reviews about the way the book is written - noting the obvious sexism and some political incorrectness. Now, I'm not just going to give the book a free pass, but's not forget the context of this book, which was written in 1953 and through the lens of a character who freely admits he is selfish and hypocritical. When Bond joins up with his unwelcome companion Vesper, he is self aware enough to know that she has done nothing to deserve his ire and that it is merely a consequence of him wanting to work alone. To be honest, that's more than I thought I would get out of Bond's perspective and am pleased to see some level of reflection within the character.
Other elements, such as some of the initial descriptions of Le Chiffre, for example, are harder to defend. The book is suffering somewhat due to it's age, that's a fact, and is true of a number of classic books. However, most of these elements, while a little dated, I found made sense within the story and worked to illustrate the characters. Even Bond's inner monologue about Vesper after the kidnapping. I thought it perfectly represented the cold, stubborn and independant character of Bond - so wrapped up in the mission that nothing but absolute perfection will do. He's not a marvel movie hero. He's a good guy capable of doing very evil things, and I think the flaws shown in his character are something everyone could learn from.
Anyway, with all that being said, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. There is a lot of action sequences packed into a very small timeframe and I managed to finish the whole thing in a few hours, spaced out over a couple of days. The only area where the story loses some traction is in the ending where we spend a lot of time reading about Bond and Vesper basically just hanging out after all the action is over. I thought this could have been compressed into a much shorter experience to make for a punchier ending. The rest of the story is excellent however and always plunges Bond straight into the action.
I'd like to add that I skipped the introduction and I would recommend you do too. I have nothing against Anthony Horowitz, but this aspect of classic books is always so boring and usually spoils the ending.
TLDR;
- Lots of action - overall thrilling, compelling book
- Similar experience to the movie
- Book is beginning to show it's age - still worth a read!









