Following Live and Let Die, Ian Fleming continued with Bond in 1955s' Moonraker. Sir Hugo Drax is a war soldier who after the war finds a carrer in the expensive world of columbite-a metal essential to the production of jet engines, and he is now the financer for the Moonraker Project. M has his suspicions about Draxs' claims regarding the mission and that because "..Drax cheats at Cards", he should be carefully checked out. So it is up to Bond to find out the truth about the slick player who uses his cigarette case for more than just storage.
As the story moves along, Bond meets up with Draxs' personal secretary Gala Brand and the two of them discover that there is much more to this Moonraker project. Why is the entire work crew of the rocket German? And why do they all share similar physical features? The truth of these and other threatining questions comes out as Bond gets too close to Draxs' real plans. This book is entertaining, and many consider this to be one of the best Fleming novels. He uses much of this novel to describe Bonds' London life and the development of the villian seems to take up most of the novels first half . For me, the plot didn't really seem to move as swifly as I'd hoped.
I can't say I was totally dissapointed though because the book does have it's high points. Suspenseful
scenes like the card game at Blades and the Blowtorch incident do get plastered into ones' mind, and the
last 60 pages or so are a real treat for any Bond fan as they keep you interested and somewhat captured in
the moment, but after reading everything I had about Moonraker and how much it is praised, I was expecting a
little more. All in all, Moonraker is a good book and a fun read, however it didn't quite live up to it's two
predecessors and later Fleming stories like Dr.No and The Spy who Loved Me were much more entertaining.
***1\2 out of *****
© 1997 amonte007@hotmail.com
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