On Her Majesty's Secret Service (2003) - Plot & Excerpts
All he remembered, before sleep took him, was that she had said when it was all over, "That was heaven, James. Will you please come back when you wake up. I must have it once more." Then she had turned over on her side away from him and, without answering his last endearments, had gone to sleep - but not before he had heard that she was crying.What the hell? All cats are grey in the dark.True or false?ALL CATS ARE GREY IN THE DARKJames Bond is driving through France, where he goes every year. Why? To visit Vesper Lynd's grave. He really loved her, for all his ugly words about her. I know he really loved her because she was the woman he was thinking of when he thought he was dead in Goldfinger. Fleming is not really one to play up the mushy stuff, but it's through these little tidbits that James's true feelings become clear.As he drives to visit Vesper, he is crafting in his mind his letter of resignation to M. He is planning on resigning from the Secret Service. James is passed on the road by a woman driving very fast. Women who drive fast make Bond excited.She loses him, but luckily when he arrives he finds they are staying in the same hotel. He asks around and finds out that she is La Comtesse Teresa di Vicenzo. Bond is disappointed to hear it - he thinks she is quite out of his league.They run into each other at the casino, and Teresa suffers quite an embarrassing loss that she is unable to cover. Bond steps in like a man and casually covers the 20 million francs she owes. Then he proceeds to lose his remaining 20 million at the table, and goes to join her at the bar. The woman seems a bit sad and lifeless, so James needles her about their little race, claiming that he could have beaten her. This makes her suddenly come to life, as she argues she would have won.The gambit succeeded. Vivacity came into her face and voice. "Oh, yes, I'd have beaten you anyway. I'd have passed you in the villages. Besides" - there was an edge of bitterness in her voice - "I would always be able to beat you. You want to stay alive."James is starting to get the picture. Then, she hits him with this:"My name is Tracy...Teresa was a saint. I am not a saint. ... I am not interested in conversation. And you have earned your reward."She rose abruptly. So did Bond, confused. "...There if you wish, you can make the most expensive piece of love of your life. It will have cost you forty million francs. I hope it will be worth it."She instructs James to meet her in her room. There, things get even weirder. James sits on the edge of the bed, intending to ask her some questions and get to know her a bit. Tracy quickly shuts that down."I said 'no conversation.' Take off those clothes. Make love to me. You are handsome and strong. I want to remember what it can be like. Do anything you like. And tell me what you like and what you would like from me. Be rough with me. Treat me like the lowest whore in creation. Forget everything else. No questions. Take me."Bond obeys, and an hour later, leaves her crying in bed (it's implied that this is because she's screwed up in the head and going through some issues, not because Bond physically hurt her or anything. Just clearing that up). He is confused, intrigued, and fascinated by this woman. He complies with her request to come back for round two, which he hopefully rates as 'a bit more affectionate' than round one. He is desperately looking for some sign of feeling from the woman. But after this second round of sex, instead of planning a fun day of eating and swimming and gambling together like Bond wants to do, the woman has a bit of a freak-out. She yells at him and curses at him, and orders him to get out of her room. She says he's lousy in bed. Bond can see she's obviously trying to drive him away and wound him, and he's very worried about her. She's obviously going through some heavy stuff.It's because of this that he decides to play 'spy' and follow her when she goes to the beach. He's convinced she's suicidal and wants to watch over her and prevent her from killing herself if he can. But just when he catches up to her on the beach, they are both kidnapped.And this is only the first four chapters out of a 27-chapter book!...HAPPINESS WITHOUT A SHADOWWell, this is famous for being the most touching, most heartbreaking Bond book in the series. Just mentioning the title to a certain friend of mine makes her little face fall. "That book is so sad," she says in a grim voice. "So sad." And it is. This is only the second time we've seen Bond really in love with a woman - not since Vesper Lynd in Casino Royale has James ever had these kinds of feelings for a woman. And it's surprising.(view spoiler)[Tracy's dad is a mafia boss, and he offers Bond 1 million pounds to marry Tracy. He thinks Bond will convince Tracy - through loving her - that life is worth living again. She was married to a horrid man who took all her money and left her when she was pregnant. She loved her baby, but the little girl died at age 6 months from spinal meningitis. Ever since then, Tracy has been roaming Europe in her car, spending money like crazy and getting the most out of life before she kills herself. Bond was kind of a 'last fling' for her. (hide spoiler)]
I guess if you write a number of books concerning the same character it’s almost inevitable that you’d get bored. Arthur Conan-Doyle did it, as did Agatha Christie – and here is Ian Fleming doing the same. ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’ was a not overly successful attempt to fiddle around with the Bond formula; however ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ is an altogether more convincing step in a different direction. Whereas the previous book tore everything up to give a very different kind of Bond tale, this novel merely tweaks things to give - a still recognisable, but - far more affecting James Bond adventure.This is of course the book where James Bond gets married. And I found myself convinced that in Tracey, Commander Bond had found someone he would want to settle down with. I don’t really see it as a traditional love story – it’s far too sharp and sudden for that – but I can see these characters as two lonely wanderers who want a more secure life and see in each other someone who would make that possible. Bond is getting on, he’s meeting men younger than he is (the splendidly named Sable Basilisk for one), the ‘beatnik problem’ is becoming a concern for the department (those damn kids!) and he’s thinking idly of having children and security. In Tracy he sees someone who will be there for him, who will entertain him, care for him and give him what he wants – while still letting him live his same dangerous and crazy life. And she sees someone who will keep her calm and (she thinks) make her safe. Given Bond’s more carefree and casual existence with women in previous books, this is a huge leap. And Fleming is very clever in having all roads lead back to Tracey in both the plot and in Bond’s psyche.I wonder how much thought Fleming gave to actually keeping this couple together forever.(Interestingly, it’s the first book to be written after Bond had been immortalised on celluloid, and it’s on film that the ‘Bond formula’ would be really set in stone. [Even if, as memory serves, this book was actually filmed rather faithfully.] 007 is given a Scottish parent to suit Connery’s lilt, while the fictional Bond encounters the original screen Bond girl Ursula Andress.)Unlike the previous book this is a gentle pushing of the envelope. Bond, despite his imminent betrothal, remains much the same character as before – still cruel, obsessed by the job and a hot blooded male when the right moment arrives. His consumerism is again unharnessed, with watches, skis and “Pinaud Elixir, the prince of shampoos” all rhapsodised over. There is no danger of scaring off the regular reader here, even if it wouldn’t be best place to start if you’d never read a Bond novel before. It isn’t perfect by any means – descriptions of card playing, car racing and alpine sports all go on far too long – but it’s the Bond novel which aims to be emotionally affecting and largely succeeds.
What do You think about On Her Majesty's Secret Service (2003)?
Definitely my favorite Bond book yet!First off, the plot only demands a reasonable amount of suspended disbelief. First, an Alpine resort hide out is a lot more believable to me than the Island of Dr. No. Second, the evil plot of SPECTRE is almost believable. Using hypnosis to trick people into using biological-weapons to infect agricultural products (mad-cow, swine flu, avian flu, etc...) would be an interesting way to wage economic war on a country as small and isolated as England. It's only the hypnosis part I struggle with... and maybe that's just my skepticism.Additionally, there is the usual Fleming use of AMAZING coincidence to get Bond out of a bad scrape - but I've been reading so many of these as I've plowed through the Fleming/Bond cannon, I've gotten used to them! Finally, it seems like Bond (Fleming) finally gets reflective about his womanizing, caddish ways. Bond actually falls in love for the first time, and decides that it is time for a relationship that doesn't leave his conscious nagging him.I loved Bond's nightmares and cold feet about getting married. I was actually feeling sad and a little heat-broken at the ending - though that could also have been the three glasses of wine...
—David Orphal
This is perhaps one of the most surprising Bond books out of the five that I've now read. I wont explain all of why its surprising because I think its better to be just as shocked as I was when you read it rather than know going in. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is the second entry into the infamous Blofeld trilogy where Bond finally meets his match in a dastardly villain.After the events of Thunderball and The Spy Who Loved Me we find 007 back where it all started, The Casino Royale. This choice to return to the casino is framed by the writing of his resignation letter from the secret services, he feels as though he's finally had his fill and wants to spend the rest of his life abroad. This is also when he meets Tracy, a young depressed girl who races him on the country roads leading to Royale. This chance encounter leads to a conversation with her father in which Bond learns where Blofeld has taken up residence after operation Thunderball, and under the guise of a records man looking to confirm the new Blofeld's claim to a family dynasty he fly's out to the mans hideout. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is different from most of the Bond books for two reasons, it's much slower paced and it's a lot more emotional. As I mentioned above the story is framed by the writing of his letter of resignation and for a lot of the book James is contemplating life after the completion of the current operation, and all of this makes for some really intelligent writing about a life after service in a life of secrets and action. James doesn't really want to be up in the alps but he knows that he must, that if is isn't there then Blofeld will be able to do whatever he wants, and James, for what is probably the first time ever, has a crisis of conscience between preserving his own life and taking down a threat that he knows affects everyone.The second part of what makes it different is the pacing, most Bond books do have a period of slowness where he investigates, but almost all of this book is investigation and meetings surrounding the events that we know are happening. The action finally comes at what is probably the last twenty pages or so and it really only serves as a bookend to what we've been reading for the past hundred and fifty. Action comes and goes very quickly but its not without reason, clearly this Blofeld is not only hard to track and pin down but he also has the ability to evacuate quite quickly if need be and Mr. Fleming writes the ending of this story with that in mind.The only problem I had with this book was that it seems to fall in a weird place between a character study and an action novel, almost as if it wants to have its cake and eat it too. I would have preferred more of cliffhanger as the team returned to the mountain with more time focused on James than to have it split so suddenly. Other than that minor complaint its quite a fantastic little novel. This book, ultimately, is about the character that you've come to know for eleven books. Its about his insecurities as he grows older and what he really wants beyond a life of espionage. Mr. Fleming humanizes Bond in this book and I think that was a great choice, seeing the layers of stone peeled back to see the real human underneath. Plus the ending features quite the gut punch, that comes as total devastation after warming to this newer version of 007. Read it and I'm sure you'll feel just as I did, and you'll truly hate his arch nemesis.
—Josiah Hawkins
This is that one Bond movie that featured George Lazenby, some guy no one had heard of before and has never heard of since. My childhood memory of the movie was that this was a real snooze and I've always (possibly unfairly) blamed Lazenby for that. Sean Connery was never boring, was my reasoning. (Also not true.)In any case, because my childhood memories can be somewhat persuasive (in spite of being highly illogical or unreliable), I wasn't particularly looking forward to seeing this one again.I was pleasantly surprised!The movie really isn't as bad as my memory told me, and more surprisingly was that Lazenby wasn't nearly as bad as I thought I remembered. Wtf, Memory? This is probably the first of the Bond movies to have a somewhat surreal tone to it (Lazenby wears a kilt at one point and hypnosis to cure allergic reactions to things like... chickens... is a predominant feature to the story).And, I'm sorry, can I just say? Telly Savalas as Blofeld. Who came up with that one? Brilliant, I say. Just brilliant.As far as the book - again with the surprises! The movie actually is very close to the original book which might be the first I've encountered in this experience. There weren't any scenes in the book that I wished had been included in the movie. The movie certainly embellished on some things, but as usual the movie tones down some of Bond's more disturbing behaviors, like seducing a woman just by putting his hand on her breast. (I'd argue that if there's ever any hypnosis going on, it's being done by Bond. No one can have women drop their drawers as quickly and easily as these Bond girls without some brainwashing.)Bond himself is actually somewhat chill in this book. He calls his future wife a "goose" at one point, and he sleeps with some women in her absence. But compared to some of the books that I've read before this one, I'd have to say this one is almost normal.This could be attributed to the fact that there's an actual love story here between Bond and the Countess Teresa "Tracy" Draco, daughter of the head of the Unione Corse. (Another surprise! Corsicans!) Things don't end up all fluffy as one would hope for Bond, however, and honestly that whole relationship felt a bit contrived, at least in the novel. We meet Tracy in the beginning, she shows up in the end, and in the middle there's this whole non-Tracy stuff going on and her appearances felt someone forced. At least in the movie this could be edited differently.So, Corsica and Switzerland, exactly two of the same places we just visited last fall - not long enough yet for the descriptions of Corsican violence and the loveliness of the Alps to not make me feel homesick for those places. I'm not going to say that those are the reasons that I liked this book (and maybe even the movie) more than the others I've read so far, but they're probably contributing factors.Next up... Diamonds Are Forever.
—El
