| " The founder and chairman of this private enterprise for private profit was Ernst Stavro Blofeld. " — Ian Fleming, Thunderball |
After miserably failing a routine health evaluation, Bond reluctantly follows M's orders to check in to Shrublands health clinic. There he dries out for two painfully dull weeks, allowed only water, tea, vegetables, plenty of sleep, books and walks. No work. No drink. No women. It's there at Shrublands though that 007, in a near-back-breaking massage appointment, meets a shadowy character with ties to a secret organization known only as SPECTRE.
They've just stolen two atomic bombs from England, and are ransoming them, under threat of detonation. In the unprecedented emergency, M calls in every agent to scour the globe for leads, Bond himself leaving Shrublands for the Bahamas to investigate a suspicious 'treasure hunt' led by Emilio Largo.
Amidst the private yachts, moonlit scuba diving, and bloodthirsty sharks, he dives deeper into the ranks of SPECTRE, crossing paths with Domino Vitali, Largo's mistress, and ultimately comes to confront who will ultimately become 007's arch-nemesis, the cerebral Enst Stravro Blofeld.
Paging in as one of Fleming's longest missions (262 pages / 4 hr read time), Thunderball, returns Bond to the familiar, yet exotic locale of the Caribbean like in Moonraker, Casino Royale, and Dr. No. Some of my favorite passages from the novels are in here, especially Fleming's descriptions of the underwater worlds, and Domino Vitali's appearance. [JG]
They've just stolen two atomic bombs from England, and are ransoming them, under threat of detonation. In the unprecedented emergency, M calls in every agent to scour the globe for leads, Bond himself leaving Shrublands for the Bahamas to investigate a suspicious 'treasure hunt' led by Emilio Largo.
Amidst the private yachts, moonlit scuba diving, and bloodthirsty sharks, he dives deeper into the ranks of SPECTRE, crossing paths with Domino Vitali, Largo's mistress, and ultimately comes to confront who will ultimately become 007's arch-nemesis, the cerebral Enst Stravro Blofeld.
Paging in as one of Fleming's longest missions (262 pages / 4 hr read time), Thunderball, returns Bond to the familiar, yet exotic locale of the Caribbean like in Moonraker, Casino Royale, and Dr. No. Some of my favorite passages from the novels are in here, especially Fleming's descriptions of the underwater worlds, and Domino Vitali's appearance. [JG]
FAVORITE QUOTES
3. "Two days later, Bond was once more back in the half-world of the nature cure. The routine of the early morning gass of hot water, the orange, carefully sliced into symmetrical pigs by some ingenious machine wielded, no doubt, by the wardress in charge of diets, then the treatments, the hot soup, the siesta, and the black, aimless walk or bus ride to the hearest tea-shop for the priceless strength-giving cups of tea laced with brown sugar. Bond loathed and despised tea, that flat, soft, time-wasting opium of the masses, but on his empty stomach, and in his febrile state, the sugary brew acted almost as an intoxicant."
2. "James Bond was right. The outcome of this rather childish trial of strength between two extremely tough and ruthless men, in the bizarre surroundings of a nature clinic in Sussex, was to upset, if only in a minute fashion, the exactly-timed machinery of a plot that was about to shake the governments of the Western world."
1. "Everywhere there were octopuses, small ones, but perhaps a hundred of them, weaving on the tips of their tentacles, sliding softly away into protecting shadows, changing their camouflage nervously from brown to a pale phosphorescence that gleamed palely in the patches of darkness. The whole fuselage seemed to be crawling with them, evilly, horribly, and as Bond shone his torch on the roof the sight was even worse. There, bumping softly in the slight current, hung the corpses of a crew member. In decompression, it had risen up from the floor, and octopuses, hanging from it like bats, now let go their hold and shot, jet propelled to and fro inside the plane—dreadful, glinting red-eyed comets that slapped themselves into dark corners and stealthily squeezed themselves into cracks and under seats."
2. "James Bond was right. The outcome of this rather childish trial of strength between two extremely tough and ruthless men, in the bizarre surroundings of a nature clinic in Sussex, was to upset, if only in a minute fashion, the exactly-timed machinery of a plot that was about to shake the governments of the Western world."
1. "Everywhere there were octopuses, small ones, but perhaps a hundred of them, weaving on the tips of their tentacles, sliding softly away into protecting shadows, changing their camouflage nervously from brown to a pale phosphorescence that gleamed palely in the patches of darkness. The whole fuselage seemed to be crawling with them, evilly, horribly, and as Bond shone his torch on the roof the sight was even worse. There, bumping softly in the slight current, hung the corpses of a crew member. In decompression, it had risen up from the floor, and octopuses, hanging from it like bats, now let go their hold and shot, jet propelled to and fro inside the plane—dreadful, glinting red-eyed comets that slapped themselves into dark corners and stealthily squeezed themselves into cracks and under seats."
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
| Ian Fleming (1908-1964) served as Assistant to the Director of Naval Intelligence during World War II, a key player in English and Allied espionage efforts. His travels, interests, and wartime experiences birthed his first novel, Casino Royale, which he penned from "Goldeneye," his home in Jamaica in '52. The first printing sold out in the first month. Fleming went on to write twelve James Bond novels in twelve years, with sales skyrocketing four years later, after President Kennedy named Fleming's fifth, From Russia With Love, one of his favorite books. Sixty-five years later, over one hundred million copies of Bond's adventures have been sold. |
| My friend and old colleague Justus Zimmerly recently completed a full James Bond film marathon in time for Spectre. You can read it on Huckberry here. Thunderball as a movie didn't fare well with him, but it does for me! |
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