Casino Royale by Ian Fleming

Introducing James Bond: charming, sophisticated, handsome, chillingly ruthless and licensed to kill. This, the first of Ian Fleming's tales of secret agent 007, finds Bond on a mission to neutralize a lethal, high-rolling Russian operative called simply "le Chiffre" -- by ruining him at the Baccarat table and forcing his Soviet spymasters to "retire" him. It seems that lady luck is taken with 007 -- le Chiffre has hit a losing streak. But some people just refuse to play by the rules, and Bond's attraction to a beautiful female agent leads him to disaster and an unexpected savior...

This was fine. I knew it would be dated, but wow. Don't really have a desire to read more, but I figured I should give Bond a chance.

Good, not great. Showed a different kind of Bond than we see in the movies, which was interesting. Is this because it is the first book, and the later books will be more typical? Or did the movies change things to be less nuanced?

The Book is interesting. I watched also a movie. Both are good. I like James Bond adventures. You can read this Book

I'm a big Bond movie fan and much to my shame, I've never even cracked the spine of any of Fleming's original novels. I decided to rectify that and starting at the beginning seemed like a very good place to start.

The 2006 adaptation is one of my favourite Bond films and you can see from where the movie took many of its cues. However, the book was certainly ‘of its time' and a large amount of acceptance was required to put the often awkward racism, sexism, misogyny and older language use into a historical context. Poor old 1953 Vesper Lynd is certainly a long way from Eva Green's brilliant modern portrayal.

An interesting and enjoyable read, I'm definitely going to carry on with the other 007 books.