James Bond Meets Iron Chef

Over the course of two days on the beach, I read the latest installment of the James Bond series, The Devil May Care. Penned by Sebastian Faulks as Ian Flemming, the novel follows Bond through Iran as he tracks an evil dude with a deformed hand (it looks like a monkey paw).

Bond attempts to thwart monkey paw's plans to kick start a cold war, relying on a cast of American, British and Iranians characters to assist him.

If it seems like I am being light on details, it's because very little of this novel's plot, characters or themes made any kind of impression. That said, what more does one want from a beach read?

I have never read a Bond book before, so I am not sure how Faulks fares in capturing Flemming's voice. I suspect Faulks relies too heavily on descriptions of food (I could list every meal Bond eats or doesn't eat during his time in Tehran) while skipping nervously over more intimate encounters (it is still not clear to me if Bond actually has sex in this story or not).

Rules on caviar are expressed with the kind of heavy-handed glee novice researchers usually impart in their early novels (Gee, did you know caviar should smell like the sea, not like fish?) and it betrays an authorial insecurity about Bond's character.

That said, now having the sweet joy of imagining Daniel Craig shirtless in every scene made reading The Devil May Care a much more enjoyable beach experience than say, imagining Roger Moore taking on a dude with bad teeth.