Death is Forever

Death is Forever by John Gardner

The last time I reviewed one of the John Gardner/James Bond books, I notated that I needed to take a break from the series.  Truth be told, these books aren’t really meant to be literary classics, nor or they meant to rival anything on a current best seller list.  For about 15 years, author John Gardner seemed to methodically churn out a story based on the most popular spy in popular culture ever - 007.  Although most argue his books are good, they will also argue that this author is no match for the superhero’s “father”,  the late great Ian Fleming.  But Fleming had now been dead for almost 30 years when this story was written, and I’ve always maintained that if Fleming were still alive, his style of writing that made him one of the greats a half a century ago, simply wouldn’t hold the same appeal for modern audiences.

But plod along John Gardner does, and this particular piece of work is one of his better ones.  I purposely made myself slow down a bit, and made sure that I read the story in digestible chunks as to not rush through, and for this I’m glad.  Some of Gardner’s books have been a bit too outlandish with colorful villains and cavernous mansions etc.  Whereas that may be acceptable for some of the films, the books tend to be more favorable with a more straight-forward, linear plot.  I also imagine that it became a bit harder for spy writers once the cold war was officially over in the early to mid-nineties.  Many of the sources for traditional bad guys were no longer from acrimonious countries.  Who could be the big bad villains now that the Russians and East Germans were all of the sudden good guys?

Well, the villain is an ex-East German baddie - named Wolfgang Weisen, or “The Poison Dwarf”.  Even though we’re all now on the same side, the dwarf wants revenge and so members of an elite, good guy, clandestine service called “The Cabal” start being picked off one by one.  James Bond is called in and.....well, you know the rest.

About the only thing I didn’t care for was the Bond Girl.  Her name is Eazy (short for Elizabeth), and the problem is that Bond Girls are either highly disposable (meaning they’re there at the end with our hero in some climactic love scene and then gone forever), or James Bond literally falls in love with his lady - which means she has to somehow die (think Tracy in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service or Vesper in Casino Royale).  This one, Gardner wants it to be the latter (i.e. we’ll kill her off because Bond is falling for her), but there is absolutely no chemistry between the two that would differentiate her from many of Bond’s flights of fancy.  When we’re “told” that Bond is starting to have strong feelings for her, but not allowed to actually see nor feel anything developing between the two, we almost know for sure about the tragedy that will unfold.

Overall, though, this one was pretty good.  I have two more John Gardners to go before I can start on the Raymond Benson Bond novels (I already have them, and they’re constantly staring at me from the bookshelf - almost imploring me to hurry up and finish the Gardner books so I can pick them up).  As tempting as the newer Benson novels are, I will still do everything in my power to not rush through the last two Gardner books, and try to enjoy them.  I’m hoping they resemble this one.