Carte Blanche

Discussion & Review Forum For James Bond Books Written By Jeffrey Deaver (born May 6, 1950)
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Goldeneye
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Carte Blanche

Post by Goldeneye »

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Carte Blanche (2011)

"The face of war is changing. The other side doesn't play by the rules much anymore. There's thinking, in some circles, that we need to play by a different set of rules too..."

James Bond, in his early thirties and already a veteran of the Afghan War, has been recruited to a new organization. Conceived in the post-9/11 world, it operates independent of MI5, MI6 and the Ministry of Defense, its very existence deniable. Its aim: To protect the Realm, by any means necessary.

A Night Action alert calls James Bond away from dinner with a beautiful woman. Headquarters has decrypted an electronic whisper about an attack scheduled for later in the week: Casualties estimated in the thousands, British interests adversely affected.

And Agent 007 has been given carte blanche.

Jeffery Deaver's Carte Blanche has been released in the USA, Canada, the UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, France, Czech Republic, Netherlands, Russia, Israel, and Korea. It will also be available in Spain on June 26; and in Poland on June 29.
Amazon UK wrote:James Bond is back. And in Carte Blanche, he is just out of Afghanistan, seconded to a new security agency -- one that is a distinctly separate entity from MI5 or 6. A decryption reveals that Britain is harbouring a vicious clandestine figure, and a great many people are to die -- within a week. 007 is in action in his own country for once, his hands tied by an irritating bureaucratic colleague, and up against a sinister opponent who luxuriates in the sights and sounds of death and putrefaction. And if the latter sounds like the kind of villain Lincoln Rhyme might be taking on, that’s because 007’s new chronicler is the American writer Jeffrey Deaver, creator of the quadriplegic criminologist Rhyme.

There is now a long and impressive tradition of continuing the literary adventures of Ian Fleming's superspy after his elegant creator's death, and it has to be said that the results have been only fitfully successful. The first post-Fleming Bond novel, Robert Markham’s Colonel Sun, was a lovingly crafted tribute by a pseudonymous Kingsley Amis, and did considerable justice to the original concept. The entries by the American writer Raymond Benson were generally received with less enthusiasm (proving that Benson’s considerable knowledge of Bondiana did not constitute sufficient credentials for the task), and while the veteran thriller writer John Gardner’s entries began strongly, he appeared to lose interest in the project; the last two books in his 007 sequence were workaday, to say the least. Sebastian Falk’s recent entry, Devil May Care, placed Bond back in the Fleming era, and was a diverting outing.

Like Gardner, Jeffrey Deaver is, of course, a considerable thriller writer with a body of work that has acquired a strong following (principally for his novels featuring Lincoln Rhyme). And like any writer approaching the task of continuing the adventures of Britain's most famous spy, Deaver was faced with a variety of dilemmas. Should he bring Bond into the modern age, as John Gardner (and the continuing film franchise) had done? Or should he create a period adventure in the fashion of the last non-Fleming Bond adventure by Sebastian Falks? To some degree, Deaver has opted to have the best of both worlds. This is a 21st-century Bond, post-9/11 and post-7/7 (both namechecked in this book), and Bond has given up smoking (something else that John Gardner wished upon the hero in his series). Many of the comforting facets of the Bond books are in place, including the sybaritic lifestyle and the absurdly-named women he encounters (how long did it take Deaver to come up with the name Ophelia Maidenstone?). The eternal Miss Moneypenny is on board, as is the de rigueur grotesque villain. The modern reader consuming the book (and it demands to be consumed -- at a brisk pace) will be wondering what version of the spy chief M we will encounter: a middle-aged woman with echoes of Judi Dench? No, M in Carte Blanche is an admiral (clearly, in fact, Fleming’s Sir Miles Messervy), and all the other aspects readers have come to expect in Fleming's adroitly written thrillers are satisfyingly in place. In fact, the opening suspense sequence (involving multiple deaths and the destruction of a train) is something that would have done Fleming proud. But as Deaver would no doubt be the first to admit, there was only one Ian Fleming, and any new Bond adventure is essentially an act of ventriloquism. But if such initiatives are to be undertaken, it is to the Fleming Estate’s credit that the talented Mr Deaver was chosen for the job. Fleming aficionados may have caveats, but there is no denying that Deaver's customary storytelling expertise is handsomely on display here, and Deaver can offer a frequently persuasive Fleming simulacra. --Barry Forshaw
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Re: Carte Blanche

Post by Jermaine76 »

Yeah, I'm on chapter 5 right now. So far so good.
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Re: Carte Blanche

Post by Kristatos »

I'm enjoying it so far. The reboot done right. Contemporary, but still feels like Bond, unlike some reboots I could mention.
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Re: Carte Blanche

Post by commander0077again »

Well, have finally gotten around to CB. First, hats off to Mr Deaver for trying his very best, as a life-long Bond fan, and an excellent writer. The only other book of his prior to CB I've read is The Blue Nowhere which is a good, tough read.

CB grows on you. The possible main drawbacks are, of course, the modern setting, and writing a Bond book that delivers is almost impossible unless one is Fleming. However, as in Sherlock Holmes pastiches, sometimes a writer will get d**n close ... for example, the short story Sherlock Holmes and the Devil has atmosphere of a Conan Doyle. It displays a noble Holmes who when challenged by the 'devil' (a mental patient who may or may not be the ultimate villain) to wager the soul of Dr Watson, says nothing doing; despite the prior scenes where he is blithely verbally dueling with the diablo. CB gets very close to Fleming, even though the novel is much longer than a Fleming thriller, which takes away much of the pacing. Some cons: British spellings aren't used (in the Holmes story above, the American author does use British spelling). The description pages lack the full Fleming touch. When one re-reads the Bond books' first pages, one is struck by the prose. However, Deaver does a fine job nonetheless.

Despite Bond being thrown into the modern age, I accept this as being a combination of the book and the movie Bonds. Most of the main characters are drawn with a fine line. Bond has the nice wit, irony of the original. After dinner with the Philly Maidenstone, Bond has a chance to bed her. He doesn't, because she's on the re-bound from her long-time fiancé. There's the feeling of the last scenes in Moonraker with Policewoman Brand. Moneypenny has a nice homage. Besides Bond's character, the best one is M. Although they don't have dinner at Blades, they do have lunch, and M comes across as our beloved crusty admiral with the 'damnably clear eyes' (I would have included that phrase, btw). The poorest main character from the canon is Felix Leiter. Here Deaver doesn't hit the bullseye. This isn't the Felix from the books, who describes himself as a chocolate sailor, the authority on jazz and strange motorcars. I don't recall Felix ever using 'ain't' although he uses it with irony in CB.

Some of the best scenes are when Bond is set up to kill an innocent man, and the surprise with the main villain. There are nice touches, too, with the villain being an expert on garbage (!), and the 'heroine' who is a humanitarian.

So will conclude this (for now) and say that of all the Bond writers, Commander Deaver does it the best. I am happy for him (again, fulfilling one of his dreams) and also for all the Bond fans who have a good, tough book, a return to (mostly) the Fleming 007 with bits of the film 007. Out of 5 Bezants, I have to give this at the least a very solid 4 Golden Bezants. :cheers:
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Re: Carte Blanche

Post by Daltonite Toothpaste »

I thought Carte Blanche was bloody awful. Bond was so passive, I felt that Deaver had personally insulted me.
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