“Changing world; changing times, James.”
Nearly two decades after the death of Ian Fleming, Glidrose Publications handed the future of the literary James Bond saga over to John Gardner, a writer of thrillers and spy novels, including several Sherlock Holmes continuation novels in the mid-1970s featuring the character Professor Moriarty. He also penned Boysie Oakes in 1964, a series of James Bond parody novels, the first of which was made into a film The Liquidator (1965) starring Rod Taylor. His first proper James Bond novel, Licence Renewed, was to be the first original Bond story since Kingsley Amis’s Colonel Sun in 1968 (not including two film novelizations and John Pearson’s The Authorised Biography of 007 in 1973), and it became the first of fourteen original novels Gardner wrote for the Bond franchise, in addition to two novelizations (Licence to Kill and Goldeneye). Gardner later explained that he provided Glidrose with four separate story treatments and they chose the one that eventually became Licence Renewed.
Interestingly enough, Licence Renewed takes place within the contemporaneous context that Gardner was writing. It is the 1980s: fuel prices are wonky and anti-nuclear protests are on the rise. We are given a brief introduction about a disguised man boarding an Aer Lingus flight from Dublin to London before finally reuniting with James Bond who is en route to a country cottage he bought in order to spend some relaxation time with his girlfriend. He is still considering resigning from the service or at least ‘going private’ especially since the elite Double-O program was abolished a few years ago during a realignment purge within the secret service (similar to the CIA’s famous “Halloween Massacre”). But M has decided to keep 007 around as his personal direct agent, something similar to what the Russians did with SMERSH folding their agents into various dark corners within the KGB, becoming the OKR, then the Thirteenth Department of Line F, and Department Viktor, and so on.
“As far as I’m concerned, 007, you will remain 007. I shall take full responsibility for you; and you will, as ever, accept orders and assignments only from me. there are moments when this country needs a trouble-shooter –a blunt instrument—and by heaven it’s going to have one. They can issue their pieces of bumf and abolish the Double-O section. We can simply change its name. It will now be the Special Section, and you are it. Understand, 007?”
During this time working as M’s personal direct agent, Bond has only taken a few Double-O related cases. He misses the active life, the world of danger and espionage. Notably, Bond is a bit more concerned with his health in this book (in keeping with the cultural trends of the 1980s). He exercises regularly and has drastically cut back on drinking alcohol. He even smokes a new cigarette with lower tar content specially produced by Morelands on Grosvener Street. This is a far cry from the hard-drinking, chain-smoking dapper man of the 1950s. Now, he has flecks of grey in his hair and he still bears the same trademark three-inch scar down his cheek. He wears Guerlain’s Imperial cologne and a Rolex Oyster Perpetual. But perhaps most infamously, Bond has bid farewell to his classic car, a Mark II Continental Bentley, and now drives a supped-up Saab 900. Admittedly, I am not a car enthusiast, but many fans were apparently outraged by this change in the novel. Now, most of Bond’s operations have included bugging, paperwork, analysis, and the like.
However, while en route to his weekend getaway, Bond is immediately summoned by the red phone back to headquarters (the “Transworld Export Ltd.” Building). Here, we encounter some familiar faces like Bill Tanner, Major Boothroyd, and Miss Moneypenny (and even a brief phone call with Bond’s housekeeper May). We also meet a tall, leggy woman who works in Q Branch (which develops all the “gee whizz” gadgets). Her name is Ann Reilly but she goes by the amusing nickname “Q’ute” (a joking nod to the character Q in the Bond films; she was originally set to be a female “Q” character in the novel before her name was revised at the last minute at Eon’s request; Gardner later called her nickname “unfortunate”). She flirts and seduces Bond before leading him back to her flat later later that evening (her apartment is tricked out with all manner of Q-style gadgets and a 1960s pleasure bed). Anyway, back at MI5, Bond enters M’s office where he is briefed on a new top-secret mission by M, Sir Richard Duggan (director general of MI5 and deputy assistant commissioner), and David Ross (head of the Special Branch of the Metropolitan police). There is an amusing inter-bureaucratic rivalry between these three men, but in the briefing, Bond learns that a wanted international terrorist named Franco Oliveiro Quesocriando has just made his fifth visit to a renowned but controversial nuclear physicist, the Laird of the Murik estate in Scotland named Anton Murik, “director many companies, and a nuclear physicist of both renown and eccentricity.” In reading this novel, I learned that a “Laird” is a Scottish word for “lord” of an estate. At any rate, Murik was recently kicked out of the Atomic Energy Commission due to unscrupulous business dealings and he didn’t take kindly to it. His companies include everything from a dressmaker to a developer of a product billed as the world’s safest nuclear reactor called “Murik Ultra-Safe Reactor.” In other words, an international terrorist secretly meeting with a well-connected Scottish aristocrat who just so happens to be the world’s most notorious rogue nuclear physicist is raising alarm bells within the intelligence community. Bond’s task? To trail Franco’s movements and track down his ties to Murik. Note: while reviewing the briefing materials, Bond spots a “Not for Brotherhood” tag, meaning this information is not to be shared with the CIA since M is reluctant to alert the CIA “operate[s] within the jealously guarded spheres of American influence” (Gardner apparently shares Fleming’s skepticism of the United States).
Bond is given a cover by M and outfitted with all manner of “gee whizz” gizmos from Q Branch, things like a suitcase with secret compartments, a bugging device, a pen alarm, a transmitter, night goggles, and other gadgets of sabotage, including myriad compartments and tricks within his Saab car. And Bond’s gun is an early Browning 9mm (no longer the iconic Walther PPK) originally manufactured by Fabrique National-De Guerre in Belgium. Bond then heads off to Ascot for the Royal Ascot a Gold Cup race. Here, he bets on Murik’s horse “China Blue” (which Murik has rigged to win) and uses a ridiculous ruse to get into Murik’s viewing box (he steals and then returns a missing pearl necklace to Murik’s ward, a beautiful stunning blonde and fashion model a la Lauren Bacall named Lavender “Dilly” Peacock). Her parents both died in an airplane crash but she turns 27 next year and is set for an inheritance from the estate. Almost immediately, Lavender flashes loving eyes at Bond and the quirky five foot tall Murik takes a shine to Bond. Bond quickly tells Murik he works as a mercenary and Murik invites Bond to Murik Castle. This is all too aggressive and rapid for believability, but Bond soon winds up back at Murik Castle in Glen Murcadly, Scotland where he meets Murik’s mistress, a trained physicist in her own right named Miss Mary-Jane Mashkin. He also has a run-in with Murik’s huge hulking henchman named Caber, who speaks with a hilariously thick Scottish brogue and who serves as Bond’s chief antagonist for much of the book.
Again, very quickly, Murik thoroughly explains his massive diabolical plot to Bond (“Operation Meltdown” or also “Operation Warlock”). Why would he do this? Wouldn’t Murik be more careful with his plans that have been many years in the making? Resentful of being kicked out of the nuclear energy commission after his safe nuclear reactor product was rejected, Murik is now threatening six mass nuclear detonations in England, France, Germany, and the United States. Why? To show the world that their nuclear reactors are not as safe as they believe and so his product will finally be respected. “My little plan will alert the world to the horrific danger that exists through the nuclear plants already built and working.” His plan is for the countries to give in to blackmail. The six terrorist attacks will be conducted by suicide squads, including two in America: Indian Point Unit Three (near New York City) and San Onofre Unit One (outside Los Angeles), Heysham One in Lancashire, England, Saint-Laurent-des-Eaux Two (in Orleans, France), and lastly Nord Two-Two and Esenshamm in East and West Berlin.
So why has Murik invited Bond into his castle and revealed his plans? His background research into Bond has fallen right into M’s trap and he wants to hire Bond as an assassin to kill Franco, since Franco is the only link in the chain between Murik and the suicide squads. Bond plays along with the idea, while in the night he is visited by Murik’s mistress, Mashkin, as a test, and then by Lavender “Dilly” Peacock (her nickname “Dilly” comes from the song “Lavender blue, dilly-dilly”). She comes to Bond as a lover and also as a “kind of Cassandra, uttering warnings” about how dangerous of a man Murik really is. Before Bond can escape, he is forced to fight in a day of the Highland “Games” at the castle, a medieval-styled tournament in which Bond is forced to wrestle Murik’s “Champion” Caber who has never been defeated. In the course of the fight, Bond is secretly able to use a Halothene-loaded trick lighter to surreptitiously knock out Caber, making it looking like it was just a lucky jab to the face (the fight is compared to David defeating Goliath).
Bond desperately tries to escape from the castle in the early morning hours so he can contact M and warn him about the impending nuclear crisis, but he is run into a ditch during a high-speed helicopter chase and he awakens lying on a table inside Murik’s white-tiled dungeon. Here, he is fed truth drugs while Mozart and white noise is pumped through headphones and he is repeatedly asked who he is working for. It is one of the more harrowing and memorable Bond torture sequences in the books. As is always the rule with James Bond, he is not killed by the villain (despite obviously being an antagonist to the plot) and he is taken aboard a jet plane to France where he narrowly escapes through a fence and across train tracks before stumbling upon a massive “fete” in the streets, the “Viex Saint Jean” (the feast of Saint John) in Perpignan. Bond gets swallowed up in the crowd and makes his way to a pay phone where he makes a brief connection with headquarters. But before he can really speak, Caber appears and Bond bashes the phone against his face (why doesn’t Bond simply kill Caber at this point?) From here, Bond tries to disrupt Franco who has been hired to kill Lavender, the true heir to the Murik estate. Bond makes his way to the Palais des Rois de Majorque for an upcoming fashion show (he was last here on a skiing holiday in the nearby mountains three years ago with a French army captain from the garrison). Here, Bond stops Franco from shooting Lavender and instead Mary-Jane Mashkin is accidentally killed instead. He later shoots Franco and escapes but in the final climax to the novel, Bond is captured yet again and brought aboard Murik’s massive Starlifter plane with Lavender where he plans for the both of them to witness his successful terrorist attack and expected ransom payment of 50 billion in diamonds while they are dragged out, dangling from the back of the plane. However, while in the bathroom, Bond manages to sneak tissue and cardboard between his hands, giving him just enough room to squeeze free when tied up again. In a fantastic action sequence, Bond attacks Murik, several other guards, and Caber who is finally bumped and tossed out the back of the plane to the ocean far below. Bonds then somehow manages deduce Murik’s abort code (“Lock”).
After connecting with M, Bond learns that Murik somehow managed to survive the ordeal in a secret compartment on the plane. Bond races back to Murik Castle with Bill Tanner just in time to confront Anton Murik carrying a gyrojet pistol as well as the paperwork granting the inheritance of Murik estate to his ward Lavender Peacock. At the end of a wild chase through the castle, Bond shoots Murik dead with a crossbow and he rescues Lavender’s inheritance for her. In a brief coda, we learn that Lavender, the new Lady Murik, plans to clean up her family’s estate just as her father would have wanted, and she and Bond make plans to see each other again soon.
Final Thoughts:
Originally titled “Meltdown” and also apparently “Warlock” to match Anton Murik’s name for his villainous operation, John Gardner’s first foray into the Bond universe is a surprisingly fun and thrilling read. Licence Renewed features several memorable action sequences, tons of fancy Q Branch gadgets (from Nitefinder goggles to trick suitcases), as well as several notable travelogue voyages across Europe, from a mock medieval tournament in a Scottish castle to a surprise visit to the crowded Feast of Saint John in Catalonia. But, as to be expected, Gardner’s prose lacks some of the elegance and erudition of Ian Fleming, and the 1980s feels like a tired setting, it can hardly be compared to the alluring danger of the 1950s Cold War backdrop of the early Fleming novels. Licence Renewed is perhaps more akin to the more familiar outrageous Bond movie plots, less so a novel, since it portrays a larger-than-life megalomaniacal genius holding the world ransom in exchange for unbelievable riches. As such, the biggest problem for me in the novel is the sheer lack of believability. Why would Murik instantly trust Bond and invite him into his orbit? Do we really believe he would invite a random stranger to his castle and explain his whole global plot? Why wouldn’t Murik have already hired his own assassin to kill Franco in the first place? Why does he keep Bond alive even after discovering he is completely disloyal? Murik is clearly a flawed somewhat cartoonish character who has developed a flimsy global ransom scheme, the likes of which is beyond parody at this point, but I have to admit I still enjoyed this one. There are some nice (albeit brief) connections to past novels in the series, such as a nod to Bond’s relationship with Felix Leiter and a reference to Bond’s faded white blemish of the Cyrillic letter III stretching way back to the torture sequence in Casino Royale. Plus many of our old friends in MI5 return again (with even Bill Tanner playing a surprisingly important role at the end of the book). Licence Renewed is a nicely serviceable James Bond novel that comes recommended from me to Bond fans. At the very least, you have to give John Gardner credit for being willing to take James Bond into a new era.