When’s the next book please …

Wow that was a lot of 00’s (or is it 00s’ I am an accountant not linguist) anyway lots of characters and locations, guess would make a great film, especially while we all descide who the next Bond is….

Gives us a little more time

And who would have thought it

Really enjoyed it will listen again too to enjoy it now I know where we go and of course where we wait…

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Where is Bond??

I know that this is the start of a new trilogy and I must say I cannot wait for the next titles to be written. There are multiple questions though... Where is James Bond? Where did he go? Was he KIA? The book does also feature Felix Leiter who in the last Bond movie met with an untimely demise, so I found it a little bit odd that he plays a relatively large part in this story.

A little bit of wokery springs up from time to time, but I guess that is the way of the world now, so have to just suck it up and move on.

If your looking for a new direction in the Bond universe, then this title is definitely for you.

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A new and expanded take

I've wanted a book that expanded on the lives of the other 00s for years, and this delivered. It reintroduces many classic Bond characters, and Kim Sherwood has paid attention to Flemings work in many details. whilst some elements make if a little too modern for my liking, this is still a good book and another adventure to take in 007s world.

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Excellent expansion of the 00-Universe

This is an excellent novel by Kim Sherwood, woth great narration too. This features the James Bond characters you know and love, excluding the man himself as he has gone missing. A really diverse mix of characters, great action, great twists. Ignore the reviewers calling it "woke", as clearly they can't handle having a black character, asian character or gay character, or that Moneypenny got a promotion. Also beware that some reviews reveal a bit spoiler!

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Excellent reading of an intriguing premise

A very impressive reading for the latest continuation novel in the James Bond series. The plot is complex, the characters admirably diverse giving a fresh feel. All the more impressive as Bond is absent

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Average

Confusing start so it took a while for me to engage. There was an excess of description some of which made me raise my eyebrows and the watch and car references became tedious. However, the ending was more exciting.

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A solid start, a bit long but promising

James Bond is missing but his influence can be felt across this novel.
Having three main characters as well as setting up a whole new paradigm of storytelling means this story is pretty long, maybe a touch overly long. The story seems to flashback at times which isn’t always clear to the listener.
I really liked the character of Joanna Harwood and Moneypenny’s role, I’m not overly fond of how Bill Tanner was handled but it does create some space going forward for new names to take on familiar roles in the department.
The redrawing of Q is a very clever idea and in this day and age makes sense. I could take or leave Joseph Dryden as a character definitely the Craig-eta blunt instrument but just didn’t resonate with me.
No issue with him being gay, however I feel the familiar relationship with Luke Luck was way to coincidental.
You can understand some of ill-informed criticism of having a female lead agent, Asian agent and gay agent as the focus of this book reeking of virtue signalling however having read this book twice (read and listened) I feel it was possibly one giant plaster to fix the fundamental shortcomings of book franchise that hasn’t really evolved in 70years.
The question is did it have to? Take the James Bond out of a James Bond book and it does loose something of what makes a Bond Book however in return we have a story that has some of the DNA of a Bond story without a spate cheap imitations. So a Bold swing, one that was arguably needed and sets up nicely the next book in the series.

Narration
I think this is only the third or fourth Bond book I’ve listened to with female narration and it makes sense as there is a very strong female voice across this story.
The problem is that sometimes I found the narration a bit to soft and I lost attention meaning I had to go back and repeat chapters.

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Now listen carefully 00...

This is a spy thriller very much of today, and will appeal very much to a 21st century audience. It tries to marry together the legendary content within this 21st century time frame, which at first feels a little jarring at first but once jigsaw comes together it makes a lot of sense.

The story structure is a little clunky and jumps around a lot (feeling more like a TV show with quick editing) but as a whole is an interesting idea and the characters feel fresh out of Spooks rather than Ian Fleming's typewriter, but this isn't to say they are well written and you warm to them quickly.

The performance by Pippa Bennett-Warner was as you'd expect from a great up and coming actress, I had a double take when hearing her Moneypenny, the echos of Samantha Bond are uncanny. The other roles are good and sounds like she had some fun with the accents.

Overall, a good start, feels like the writer is still trying to find thier feet within the universe, but I look forward to seeing how the next part in this trilogy unfolds.

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stick with it

I found the number of characters and storylines confusing to begin with but stick with it and this turns into an excellent spy thriller.

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Very difficult to follow

I like the characters and the story is interesting, but it's so very multi-layered and complex it's very difficult to follow, especially when there are so many characters and the narrator, as great as she is, can only carry off so many different voices (few of which are convincing if I'm honest.

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