Doctor No by Ian Fleming
General Thoughts
Throughout this year, I have been listening to Ian Fleming's James Bond series. I have been a fan of Bond for most of my life and have only watched a handful of films. When the Bond 50 box set was released, my wife and I watched all of them in chronological order and ranked them on Post-It notes on our closet door. Reading the original source material has been fun and thought provoking and was partially the inspiration for creating Four Eye Books.
Dr. No(1958) is the sixth James Bond book in the series released just one year after From Russia With Love(1957). In this story,M sends James Bond on a mission to Jamaica to investigate the disappearance of an MI6 agent and his secretary. Ian Fleming is a master at creating believable worlds with memorable characters. All the elements that are ingrained in our pop-culture collective memory are here: exotic locations, mysterious foes, the "Bond Girl" and much more. The tension is high for most of the book until the last few chapters where it explodes into a thrilling series of action sequences. This was a really impressive entry into the series. You don't have to read the Bond books in order to enjoy them but it is a richer experience if you do.
A note about the audiobook version:
This edition was narrated by Hugh Quarshie(Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald). He did a wonderful job making each character feel distinct with their own personality. Being a story set in Jamaica, it was a wise choice to have a person of color do the narration. Ian Fleming includes a lot of dialect and slang for its Jamaican and 'Chigro'(Chinese Negro) characters. This is in stark contrast to Diamonds are Forever in which Rory Kinnear(The World is Not Enough, Our Flag Means Death) had to read some truly awful racist stereotypical dialogue of Black Americans in the 1950s.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Trajectory
M thinks he has an easy case for 007. That's exactly what he needs after his latest near-fatal encounter with SMERSH. However, arriving in Jamaica to look for a missing agent and his secretary, Bond learns that the reclusive Dr. Julius No could be connected with their disappearance. When Bond and the exotic Honeychile Rider are imprisoned on Dr. No’s private island, they realize that his plans could threaten international security(https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24703849-doctor-no).
Characters
One of this book's strengths is the mystery of Dr. No himself. What makes Dr. No a compelling foil is that no one knows anything about him. The majority of the information we get about him is based on stories and rumors. What elevates the storytelling is that Dr. No continues his tradition of writing Bond from his point of view. Ian Fleming rarely writes a chapter from the antagonist's perspective. This allows the readers imaginations to run wild until we encounter them in the story. When we do meet Dr. No, Fleming does a great job of portraying him as a larger than life threat. He is everything that a Bond villain should be. He is calculating, intelligent, and always three steps ahead of the heroes. It is easy to understand why Dr. No has become the archetype for many antagonists even beyond the Bond Series.
Culture/Historical Context
James Bond is one of the most iconic fictional characters in history and has been discussed by scholars for over 60 years. Dr. No includes a number of tropes that have become synonymous with the franchise. There is the secret base, the intricate yet easily evadable traps, and the villain's monologue. Those cheesy but lovable tropes are a cornerstone of our pop culture. However, it's no secret that Ian Fleming's views of race and sex are outdated, and this is no exception. For example, within the first two minutes Fleming describes a trio of characters as "Chigros" an amalgamation of Chinese and Negro. As someone who identifies as multiracial, and who has Chinese and African-American heritage, I found this quite amusing. When reading texts that contain outdated concepts, I enjoy putting the work into the historical context in which it is written. It is a time capsule into the world in which it was written and can provide insight into the authors perspective.
