The Man With The Red Tattoo

The Man With The Red Tattoo by Raymond Benson

Raymond Benson’s sixth, and last, entry in the literary James Bond series.  I must say that I thoroughly enjoyed Benson’s tenure as the official author of 007.  True, some did not, but comparing authors of James Bond is a bit like comparing the actors that played the role - everyone has their opinions.  I actually like Benson better than Ian Fleming.  I think part of the reason is that Fleming was churning out these books more than half a century ago (he died in 1964), and the style of writing that was popular then, doesn’t necessarily translate to popular mainstream fiction more than 50 years later.  Plus, for me, I saw most of the films before I read any of Fleming’s books, so my imagination was a bit unfairly biased.  We then had John Gardner (actually Kingsley Amis wrote one book in the late 60s, but in my opinion, one book doesn’t count) take over the series for about 15 years beginning in the early 1980s, but I found most of his books to be somewhat subpar and a bit confusing.

Benson always has the ability to be clear, concise, yet pack his books full of action, beautiful women, and exotic locations.  I really don’t care if he doesn’t describe people, places, and things in the same meticulous fashion as Fleming.  All I want is a good story, and not to get lost in a confusing espionage laden plot.

I will concede, however, that this book doesn’t necessarily have a stellar plot, and it can be a bit confusing.  It’s not confusing because of the plot, but it’s confusing because this book takes place in Japan, and there are lot of characters with long, hard to pronounce Japanese names with a lot of “Ys” and “Ks”.  If that sounds racist, I’m sorry.  It is what it is, and I got a bit lost with all of these protracted names.   The plot is so-so.  Apparently, some evil Japanese mafia types are trying to bring the world to its knees by germ warfare.  Specifically, they’ve manufactured a species of mosquito that can spread a lethal disease very quickly.  A very scary synopsis for someone such as myself that lives in a very humid climate in Southern Texas.  I would also think it would be a lot easier to stop a criminal superpower such as a Blofeld than it would be to stop any type of mosquito.  But anyway….

As Bond travels through Japan, Raymond Benson also gives his reader a primer in Japanese culture.  We learn an awful lot about Japanese people, Japanese culture, and Japanese customs.  Again, some readers are turned off by this diversion and find it completely unnecessary, yet it never seemed too big of a diversion for me, and I actually enjoyed the author playing a bit of a tour guide as well as telling me a story.   He also brings back some main characters from the literary Bond’s past (he did this in his last Bond book Never Dream of Dying).  For this one, we go back to the last time Bond was in Japan, which would be the Fleming Novel You Only Live Twice.  We are reintroduced to Tiger Tanaka again, as well as reminisce about the Bond girl (deceased, naturally) Kissy Susuki.  Fortunately, one doesn’t really need to read that book before tackling this one, so don’t feel as though you’ll be at any sort of disadvantage if you’re unfamiliar with that one.

Even though the overall story wasn’t as strong as others by Benson, I still really enjoyed it.  I’ve always liked the fact that even though Benson’s Bond is infallible, he’s not above pain, and walks around a lot through these stories beaten and bruised. It’s nice to see that even 007 is human.  

I’m not sure why Raymond Benson stopped after six novels.  Maybe it was his choice to stop, maybe not, but I’d highly recommend them.  If you do a search you can now find these six novels within two “collections” that will serve your reading purposes just fine if you’d like to save a bit of money.  I’m actually even eager to read more of this author’s work other than his James Bond novels.  Nice job, Mr. Benson.