About:
License to Kill by James Gardner is a novelization of the 1989 James Bond movie, starring Timothy Dalton as agent 007. Mr. Gardner has been writing the Bond novels during the movie’s production.
- 294 pages
- Publisher : Charter
- Language : English
- ISBN-10 : 1557731926
My rating for License to Kill – 4
Buy License to Kill from Amazon.com*
More books by John Gardner*
John Gardner’s Bond series (16 book series) *
Thoughts:
The movie itself had several “Bond firsts”, besides being the first Bond movie not to be titled after an Ian Fleming work and shot completely outside of England. The production also marked the end of an era for screenwriter Richard Maibaum, Maurice Binder whose title designs are now legendary, and the last one produced by Albert R. Broccoli – all who passed away.
The story line features some elements from Ian Fleming’s works, despite not using the title. Prominently there are elements from Live and Let Die, as well as The Hildebrand Rarity, as short story published in For Your Eyes Only.
As a book, License to Kill by James Gardner is not bad at all. I’m not sure when the overlap between the script/production and the novel happened, but some of the better action pieces are missing. The novel attempts to be loyal to the movie and expand on scenes which might have stayed on the cutting room floor.
This book is marketed as part of the John Gardner’s Bond series, but it isn’t. This is a novelization of the movie, and it does a fine job at it without all the elements Gardner put in his previous books. That’s not to say Gardner didn’t put in some hints that we don’t know the whole picture, but the novel is still loyal to the motion picture and not the literary Bond universe.
Gardner, who’s an excellent wordsmith, made the novel more violent than the movie. Sometimes letting your mind do the thinking instead of being shown has much more impact.
I thought the book was a very good companion to the movie, which is what it was intended to be. John Gardner focuses on realistic action scenes, vehicles and weapons instead of weaving it into the literary universe he created.
Synopsis:
Disobeying M’s orders, James Bond relinquishes his license to kill to take revenge. His best friend, CIA agent Felix Leiter has been killed by Sanchez, a drug baron.
Pam Bouvier, a CIA pilot who also happens to be a beautiful woman, as is tradition in Bond movies, flies him to Franz Sanchez’s South American headquarters disguised a disgruntled hit-man. Sanchez hires Bond, but you don’t get to run a drug empire by being stupid and Bond finds himself fighting for his life… again.
Buy License to Kill from Amazon.com*
More books by John Gardner*
John Gardner’s Bond series (16 book series) *
Disclaimer: I bought this book
*Amazon links point to an affiliate account, the money is usually spent on books
