Diamonds are Forever

Ian Fleming
Penguin 2009, Paperback, 304 pages, £7.99

Oddly for a secret agent, James Bond has been roped in to investigating a diamond smuggling operation. A dentist in Africa gives the stones to a man in a helicopter who takes them to London to be cut, and they’re sent off to America to be sold.

The plot is quite straightforward, more of a yarn than a crime drama, with events unfolding one after the other with little action required on Bond’s part beyond turning up shooting whoever needs to be shot. He meets and falls in love with his contact, Tiffany Case, continues his friendship with Felix Leiter, goes from the east coast to Las Vegas and the villain’s hideout. In this case, it’s an abandoned western town, complete with saloons, boardwalks, stetson hats, chaps and a handsome old steam train.

He is tortured, the girl helps his to escape and he does his secret agent bit, killing the bad guys in a spectacular set piece.

It’s easy to see the origins of contemporary action films and thrillers in these early Bond books. The 1960s Pan edition I bought at a jumble sale when I was 7 is now yellowed and cracked, but the promotional blurb on the back describes it perfectly: ‘Supersonic John Buchan’.

Buchan’s heroes tend to drive around having things happen to them, just as Bond turns up with a gun and a girl. Where Richard Hannay might get the train to Newton Stuart and eat sandwiches in country pubs, however, Bond flies first class to New York, dines on steak and clams and drinks meticulously-described cocktails.

The modern furniture in hotel rooms is detailed (‘well designed and made of a silvery wood that could have been birch’) along with the air conditioning and the television (‘with a seventeen inch screen’). Bond and Leiter have conversations about salad dressing and cuts of beef while they’re not dodging bullets or whooshing around in exotic cars. There’s an exciting world away from dreary old Britain, Fleming is saying, and the keys to it are these brands, these locations, this lifestyle.

Gambling is also much discussed and portrayed as something with very little chance element. The old women at the slot machines are to be pitied for their monotonous quest to pour as much money as possible onto the casino’s balance sheet, the dealers are well-drilled sharps whose main skill is to facilitate the money laundering that goes on at the 21 tables and horse racing is pure theatre. Despite everyone being aware of the crookedness Bond still goes on with the gambler’s superstitions and excitement. The chance element might be a fiction, but it’s one that it appears is worth maintaining.

The longing for domesticity can’t be suppressed indefinitely though and after a while the old desires for children, a settled home life and, above all, toast and sauce bearnaise make themselves felt and Bond installs Case in his flat and covers up his intentions – a permanent relationship – from M in his report. The character develops a little and From Russia With Love looks enticing on the bookshelf.

Related posts:

1. Noir by Robert Coover (Shane’s book 1, 2011)
2. Stamboul Train (aka Orient Express) by Graham Greene (Shane’s book 10, 2011)
3. The White Lioness by Henning Mankell (Ian’s book 5, 2011)

Mexico Set (Harper Books)

Len Deighton
Harper 2010, Paperback, 416 pages, £7.99

Continuing from Berlin Match, Bernard Samson’s wife Fiona has defected, and Bernard himself is in Mexico, looking for the soviet agent Eric Stinnes, who had arrested and interrogated him in Berlin. Dicky Cruyer, senior to Samson, goes with him to build a little south American power base for himself.

Fiona has threatened to kidnap the children and Samson is quietly and determinedly making sure he keeps them with him. He concentrates on home and duty while the rest of the service works around him on influence.

The office politics are everywhere, above him in the top floor offices, below him in the windowless records rooms and in the attractive form of Gloria Kent, a pretty girl he’s managed to add to his office staff. She is ambitious and accommodating but becomes a test of what other people will do to improve their lot and how far he will abuse his own meagre position.

Samson’s friend and compatriot Werner Volkmann has his own pretty young test of character, but he fails his. His slightly ridiculous wife, Zena, is a too-young power player who provides the other end of the scale of people involved in espionage. At one end are the senior staff in London, lacking in knowledge but swimming in power. In the middle, there’s Bernard Samson, all knowledge but increasingly led around by events with fewer free choices to make as time goes on. Zena makes choices but is utterly lacking in knowledge, and has a far too great opinion of her own judgment, so can’t help but destroy herself in the end through poor decisions taken to further her own interests.

Stinnes makes it clear that he is willing, even eager to defect, but Samson suspects his motives just as his chief, Bret Rensselaer (a name I could never work out how to pronounce) is suspecting Samson’s back in London. He suspects that Samson is still working with Fiona and that Stinnes is their go-between, and that Samson is planning to defect rather than bring Stinnes back.

The uncertainty, duplicity and office politics result in Samson’s authority being questioned which, combined with Zena’s double dealing and the new second agent’s inexperience, almost break the deal.

In the end Samson is still left under suspicion but not with certain important characters, and a new player, the seemingly innocent and bumbling  director general, is introduced. Again, the complexities of personal and professional relatonships are far more involved than the relationships of professional espionage, and danger is only found when the latter is allowed to influence the former.

Like Berlin Game, this is a book about practical activity being the only truly valuable commodity. I’m now hanging, wondering what can happen in London Match, aware that Samson’s children are still in play and that Fiona has lost more than she wished to. The complexity of office life has been somewhat lessened but the structure is still there, and his strength of character has paid off with Gloria Kent, while Werner is left stranded and lonely. I’m on the edge of my seat.

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