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It was bittersweet earlier this summer when I finished Octopussy and The Living Daylights. I wanted to make it last as long as I could but finally the impulse to know more of Bond overtook me. I’m still reading Colonel Sun, which is pretty good, but still: you can’t beat the original Fleming novels.

"Octopussy"

Well, let me start by saying that the short story is really nothing like the 83 Roger Moore film. It has elements that pay homage to its namesake short story as well as the short story "Property of a Lady," but all in all, it’s a different plot. As with other Fleming works, Bond is not in the forefront of "Octopussy"; instead we meet Major Smythe, a fat, aging military man who spends most of his time befriending sea creatures and trying to tame an octopus he calls Octopussy. (Hence the title, ya know.) Bond shows up to question Smythe about his less than upstanding conduct in WWII. Already, Smythe knows what Bond is after. Smythe had taken a mountain climber from his family after learning of a secret stash of Nazi gold. He needed the mountain climber to help him navigate the terrain and find the location. After promising the man’s safety, Smythe uses him to find the gold and then shoots him. The body falls into a crevasse and Smythe hauls the gold away. He stores it and lives off it for the rest of his life. As it turns out, Bond’s parents were friends of the murdered mountain climber. Once the remains were found after a thaw, it was clear that the man was murdered by a soldier. The puzzle was pieced together and Bond came to question Smythe. More accurately, Bond has come to tell Smythe that he will be putting a report together about Smythe’s murder of the climber so that Smythe has time to kill himself honorably if he chooses—like leaving a condemned man with a single bullet in a gun. Smythe goes out to sea to enjoy one last gathering. A venomous animal stings him and his beloved octopus devours him. A fitting way for the war criminal to go out.
Bond’s role in this is almost incidental. It’s similar in a way to "Quantum of Solace" when Bond goes to the dinner party and learns about his fellow guests. It’s a glimpse into Bond’s assignments that don’t involve fighting and carousing and larger-than-life villains.

"The Living Daylights"

This film version actually shares elements with its namesake short story. Bond is given the assignment to eliminate a KGB assassin who plans to kill a defector. Bond plays stake-out with another agent in a dark room for a number of days to prepare. Bond notices an orchestra group carrying their instruments down the street and he admires the attractive cellist. When the assassination attempt occurs, Bond sees that the beautiful cellist is the assassin. He cannot bring himself to kill her when she has done no wrong to him personally. Bond has a code of not killing "in cold blood" and feels that to murder her when wounding her would suffice would be a travesty. He deliberately misses his shot to kill her and instead hits her hand, ending both the assassination attempt on the defector and the girl’s entire career as a KGB sniper. The agent he is with tells him he will have to include Bond’s intentional miss in his report to HQ. Bond accepts this and even quips that he will thank M if he gets fired for his judgment call. (Timothy Dalton does this in the film quite stylishly.) The title of the story and the film comes from Bond’s banter that whoever the girl was, even though he did not kill her, his shot must have scared the living daylights out of her.

Of the two Dalton Bond films, I like TLD the best. The short story showed me why—it is a clever, cool idea. Bond is sent to kill an assassin but cannot. The taut nature of his confinement as he waits for the opportunity is an essential part of the short story that is not as crucial in the film. Nevertheless, it’s an instance of Bond in great form.

"007 in New York"

In this very short story, Bond is sent to New York to meet a fellow MI6 British agent whose boyfriend is actually a KGB agent. Bond’s assignment is to warn her that she is in danger. Bond meanders about the city, eating and drinking at his special haunts although, sadly, Felix Leiter never makes an appearance here. Bond’s plan has a hitch when he discovers that the meeting place he has with the girl—the reptile house at Central Park Zoo—does not exist. Essentially, this faux pas is the whole of the story. Bond’s seemingly easy job is not without complications.

"Property of a Lady"

A double agent from the Russians is set to auction off a valuable Faberge egg in London. This event is important to MI6 because the KGB is sending its London director to serve as a shill bidder. Bond is to go to Sotheby’s to spot the shill bidder and thus give the British a tremendous advantage in apprehending a powerful KGB figure. Sure enough, Bond spots the man at the auction and MI6 agents follow him out. The reader knows the man will be captured, thanks to Bond.

The most enjoyable aspect of the novel is the tension of Bond in the auction house. Like TLD, to really appreciate its value, you have to read it first-hand. It’s well worth it. Also, if you read The Man with the Golden Gun, you'll notice that one of M's test questions to Bond is about the woman from this incident, Maria. Bond tells M that she was a double agent working with the KGB and after the events of "Property," she was killed.

Dracula

The last time I read Dracula was in high school. So I decided to give it another chance and see what my opinion of it would be as an adult. And I must say I discovered that I hate epistolary novels. Blah. It’s all in past tense and comes from the perspective of one character at a time. The impact of Dracula on those around him is really the focus of the novel instead of telling Dracula’s own story. You learn much more about Mina, Lucy, Jonathan, Seward, and Van Helsing than you do about Dracula, which was a let-down to me. In the beginning, I was engrossed. I wanted to know all about what happened to Jonathan on his way to the castle and once he got there to cohabitate with Dracula. But once Jonathan escapes and Dracula’s ship sets off for England, I was tuning out. I wanted to know more about the many years of un-dead life Dracula has experienced—what did he see, what did he think of it. But no. Too much yammering on about who Lucy’s going to marry and how Mina is oh-so-resourceful for a stupid woman. Yawn. Because everything is past tense, even the gory scenes lose any scare factor because you’re not in the moment. You’re hearing about it secondhand and it loses its punch that way. I know it’s a classic but I was not impressed. The invention of Dracula as a literary character is awesome, don’t get me wrong. He is a far cry from the suave Lugosi in a cape with white skin and slick black hair. (Stoker’s Dracula sounds creepy and gross, not sexy and debonair. Not Gary Oldman in a top hat beckoning you to drink absinthe with him.) And Renfield, the crazy vampire wannabe in the asylum, is a great touch. It just takes so long to get to the precious gems that you lose interest in the petty squawkings between the cool events in the plot. Funny enough, if a scary, blood-soaked vampire novel is what you want, Dracula will probably not leave you shaking in your boots. Read it to say you did and then let it be.

The Godfather

In my quest for masculine literature, I knew I had to read The Godfather. I watched the films a long time ago so I decided to read the book and then re-watch the films to see how faithfully the movies remain to Mario Puzo's novel. Let me just say: whether you've watched the movies or you haven't (and if not: are you hiding under a damn rock?), you must read the book. It fucking rocks. You could make the argument that either Vito or Michael is the main character of the novel but the reader gets backstory on everyone connected to the family. Even Lucy Mancini's life is followed in great detail. The novel does not move at a fast pace like the film does. For me, watching the movie after reading the book was like watching the events moving at warp speed. The novel contains elements of The Godfather II, which details Vito's early life and the beginning of the Corleone family in America. The novel actually begins with Amerigo Bonasera sitting in court at the trial of two men who beat his daughter. When they are given a slap on the wrist, Bonasera turns to Vito Corleone for justice. As in the film, Vito entertains requests at the wedding of Connie to Carlo Rizzi, a man her brother, Sonny, had introduced her to. All the kids are home for this event. Michael has been away as he is a decorated war hero and a college student. His girlfriend, Kay, comes with him and seems relatively clueless that she is amongst the mob. Michael makes it clear that he is not in the family business and never wants to be. A major part of the novel (as with the film) is Michael's change of heart on this issue. Many elements carry over from the novel to the film. The lives of the other characters like Johnny Fontane (except for the horse's head incident), Nino, Lucy Mancini and the doctor in Vegas are not central to the film at all. We also learn in the novel that Jack Woltz, the famous Hollywood producer giving Fontane a hard time, is a pretty terrible guy. The film makes it seem that he is just a stubborn hothead who can't be reasoned with. In the novel, you learn that he is also a pervert who has sex with child starlets as payment for putting them in movies. So when he wakes up with Khartoum's head in his bed, it seems like a more appropriate punishment because he's been such a scumbag. And reading about the tense, frightening night when Michael decides to kill Sollozzo and McCluskey is much more intense even than the intimidating scene in the film. If you are at all a fan of the films, you must read the novel.

More reviews to come. Must go and get on with my Saturday now.