I’ve recently read the Anthony Horowitz Bond novels and enjoyed them, then realised I had this one sitting on my to-read bookshelf ready to go. It was good, travelling around the globe and using the author’s experience to portray conflict in specific countries quite well. It was a slightly tamed down version of Bond, which is understandable given how difficult he is as a character, and some of the additional characters didn’t seem to be given much room to grow, but overall a really good Bond outing.

I loved this James Bond extended series book, picking up from where previous original novels have left off. It felt very authentic, with a sort of cool, calm progression of the plot, the unruffable Bond doing what he does best, even when injured, mind-controlled, or pondering his future. The plot was fascinating, a sort of ‘what if’ situation where Bond ends up going undercover in Russia. A great read, another excellent work by Horowitz.

I’m a big fan of Anthony Horowitz’s own writing, particularly some of his more meta works, and I’ve been fond of James Bond in the past too, so combining these two things seemed like a great idea. It actually is a really good book but it surprised me and took some getting used to. Horowitz has really leaned in to the Bond fiction genre, that quiet, calculating, slowly making progress through the plot style and it’s very affecting. It’s an interesting story with consequences that gradually get higher and higher, the boat and everything that happens there was very visceral. A good book!

Way back when this James Bond spin off project was announced, I thought it was a crazy idea. Some kind of reality show where people do some challenges and answer some questions to try and win lots of money… what does that have to do with Bond? The show, 007: Road to a Million, was recently released on Prime and I watched the first episode with a similar amount of skepticism… but it hooked me in and I absolutely devoured it. Eight episodes later, I was sad we had come to the end of the journey.

It’s not going to break the box office like the film counterpart but I really love that this is a game about thought and planning and not just shooting and running. The gameplay is easy to pick up and I found it totally engrossing, keeping me playing for ages and to the point I didn’t want to put it down. With that and the fun characters you know from the 007 universe, it’s an absolute winner.

I finally managed to watch the latest James Bond installment last month, having already had a few spoilers before managing to get it on screen. And then I read a post that sparked an interest in me that I kept meaning to write about… but then Christmas happened and now this terrible year is almost over and everyone has moved on, but hey. I’m still thinking about 007!

I’ve been excited about this for too long, the many, many delays and the big hype about it returning to the cinema when plenty of people still don’t feel comfortable about sitting in dark rooms with lots of strangers, all of which were somehow both frustrating but also just adding to my expectations. Firstly, it’s important to say, this is a better movie than Spectre. I don’t remember a lot about Spectre, only that it didn’t live up to Skyfall, and I wish I’d known this was going to carry on with a lot of the same characters, as I would have rewatched ahead of time.

I’ve previously watched all the James Bond movies to date, pending Time to Die, in a big journey from the opening credits of Dr. No to the closing sequence of Spectre. It was a heck of a ride full of highs and lows and good action sequences and questionable moments, and I loved it. So having completed the movies, tick, tick, tick, what next? I decided I wanted to read the books - a series of 12 novels and 2 collections of short stories published between 1953 and 1966. In my research on the books, I found that Audible had the full series of audiobooks read by an outstanding selection of authors. I mean, just get a look at these names:

This felt like the most random of the James Bond books, like a sweeping together of previously unpublished stories following Fleming’s death. Of course it’s fine to do that, but it just makes it hang together a little oddly. As with the previous couple of books, Bond’s growing antipathy to his work shows here too - being reluctant to shoot a female assassin, and letting someone decide their own fate rather than arresting or killing them himself. The last story wasn’t really a story at all, but more of a search by Bond for good eggs in the city of New York. Odd, but still quite fun.

You can tell that this book wasn’t fully formed before Fleming died. It was published posthumously and was going through the editing process at the time, and by all accounts Fleming wasn’t very happy with it. So it’s not a surprise that it doesn’t have quite the same impact as other stories. It feels shorter, less complete, and there’s a lot less depth in certain areas. But it has all the elements a good Bond novel should have - a bad guy to chase, a thrilling action sequence, plenty of intense personal danger, and a leading lady or two.

Not a bad entry in the Bond canon, this book delves very deep into Japanese culture with a lot of detail about how James has to try and adapt to fit in with a whole new world to him. It feels like Fleming was leaning in to having a more over-arching series in the last few books - Blofeld has become a running theme, and in this book we find Bond dealing with the death of his wife which we witnessed in the previous book. Earlier novels felt more standalone but now we’ve got a character who is learning and growing. Super interesting ending too, with Bond left adrift in a foreign country having lost his memory. What will happen next?

In terms of the story, this is one that really aligns so closely with the film you can almost picture every scene, and it’s such a good adventure. I also thought Bond’s decision to marry was so interesting, this is probably one of the least fleshed out women of the series and this is who he chooses to attach himself too, I think it says a lot more about Bond at this time in his life. But that brutal ending was just as harrowing to get through as it was in the film. Great book.

What a weird entry in the Bond back catalogue? It’s like those Sherlock stories where the eponymous hero doesn’t come in until right at the last minute and there’s all this bizarre backstory that you have to fight to care about beforehand. This is similar, in that we hear all about Vivienne’s life history and it’s not until the last minute that Bond appears. Also, it’s not like a big conspiracy that the agent needs to resolve, it’s just a situation that he stumbles across and barely makes it out of alive. It’s just odd from start to finish!

At first glance, this feels like a good, traditional Bond story, with a big bad to overcome, a girl or two to deal with along the way, and some help from Felix Leiter just when it’s needed. But actually when you look closer, the book veers so far from the debonair James Bond that we know it’s almost a different character.

I really liked this, James Bond works well in the short story format, potentially because there’s no time for all the in depth explanations of card games and golf courses. Bond’s interactions with women seemed a little better in this collection of stories too - he’s still the man that he is in the time he was written, but perhaps making a tiny step forward.

The last couple of Bond adventures haven’t totally grabbed me but I liked this one quite a lot more than I was expecting. The opening chapters were so familiar from the film - Bond foiling Goldfinger’s cheating card scam - it was amazing. I wasn’t as keen on the following pieces where a game of golf is described in excruciating detail… but then we get to the Fort Knox plot and it all picks back up again.

I listened to the audiobook version of this, read by Hugh Quarshie, and it was a great reading but I can’t promise that I enjoyed the book as much as I was hoping. I was surprised at how close it was to the first film in the Bond series - I recognised a lot of the scenes in my head as they played out.

After being less enthusiastic about the last couple of Bond books, I really enjoyed this one. Things seemed to pick up and I feel like it tied in really closely to the film, I could picture a lot of the events in my head. It’s an odd one to begin with, though, as there are ten full chapters before James Bond even shows up. Instead, we’re with the bad guys finding out what makes them tick. It’s unusual but I quite liked it.

Not so sure about this one. There were bits of it I really liked, clear Bond elements that you can almost visualise on screen - the car chase ending up in a drive through cinema, the railway escapades, etc. But other bits of it weren’t that interesting. I mean, at one point Bond himself says he’s a bit bored of doing what he’s doing - if he’s not able to be interested in it, why should we care? It did touch upon a lot of elements though - horse racing, casinos, travelling by plane and by sea, some kind of mud bath sauna place, lots of things to visualise.

I’ve seen a couple more Mastermind editions that have caught my attention but this one came via a slightly different route. I wasn’t expecting to see a James Bond quiz on the BBC Sport site but there it was. Darren Bent, footballer, chose the super spy as his specialist subject but didn’t do as well as he might have hoped. The poor guy only managed to get one of his questions right, but having seen them, I’m not sure I would have done much better. The BBC have put an interactive quiz version of the questions up and have made it multiple choice - that meant I could actually answer quite a few - but faced with just the questions, like below, I would have done very poorly.

I listened to the audiobook of this, and really enjoyed it, although it’s definitely a book of two halves. The first half, with Bond being bored at his desk talking through the minutiae of the reports he has to read, and then heading into a card game to try and catch a cheater… well, that bit wasn’t exactly riveting. I’m rubbish at following card games anyway, let alone ones that I don’t really know the rules for. Still, it’s written and read very well so that you can at least feel the tension even if you don’t quite know what it’s for.

I’m still making my way through the Fleming Bond books, but had a quick detour into this prequel about a Young Bond. It’s quite a lot of fun to see Bond in a completely different light - a young boy who is nothing particularly special except full of grit and determination, morals and a wanderlust instilled by a mixed up childhood.

I listened to the audiobook of this, read by the excellent Rory Kinnear, who embodied the spirit of Bond really well. The clipped way the story is told is at first a little jarring but it soon gets you into the protagonist’s head - Bond has to live his life like that, constantly surveying, assessing danger, short, sharp movements to stay alive.

There were some brilliant moments in this film - great opening sequence, wonderful car chase around Rome, nice recall to previous films, amazing views of the train crossing the desert, fun with Q, Judi cameo, M sticking up for himself and his crew, etc, etc. Overall it was a great film, one of the better ones of Craig’s tenure.

As a book, it got off to a slow start for me. Lots of French words that didn’t make a lot of sense, and that whole report to M that took me several times to read and fully understand. There’s also the full description of how baccarat works, but I’m such a dunce at these casino card games, I couldn’t get my head around that either.

Last month, Mr C and I finished watching all of the Bond films. We’d been pondering the merits and pitfalls of doing such a thing, but when I bought the iTunes bundle of all 23 films up to and including Skyfall, it was inevitable. We finished the films just in time for the hype to start for the new film, Spectre, which means there’s a lot of great Bond content on TV and the internet just as our interest has peaked.

If you’d asked me before we started which was my favourite Bond film, I’d always say this one. Not the best, for sure, but my favourite. North Korea, hovercraft, ice palace, invisible car, Halle Berry, lots of good stunts and plenty of fun. Plus Pierce.

Two strong female characters, although I properly cannot get over the name Christmas. Bond films do funny names, I understand, but Christmas Jones isn’t a pun in and of itself, and they barely reference it until right at the end. Weird. Loved Sophie Marceau, the right mix of vulnerability and vengefulness.

On a whim, I started watching the entire series of Bond movies starting from the beginning and working through each iteration. Somewhere along the way, I realised I had the Roger Moore autobiography, but I didn’t want to read it until I’d finished watching his 007 outings. With that achieved, I dived in.

Not only is this a Brosnan Bond film but it’s also one I’ve seen before - finally! I love this film enormously. From the brilliance of Jonathan Pryce as your media mogul gone mad, to the incredible helicopter versus motorbike stunt, to the superb stealth boat and remote control car, there’s so much to love.

As much as I’ve enjoyed the process of working our way through every Bond film, I can’t quite describe the relief to get to my beloved Brosnan. I can see why people attach themselves to the different variations of the character, but Pierce is definitely mine. Suave but funny, womaniser but without the aggressiveness we’ve previous seen, an action hero with some relatively up to date kit, and that general feeling of over-the-top but fun and fantastic action.

I’ve grown to really quite like Timothy Dalton as James Bond, even though it’s only been two films. But, as Paul said to me on Twitter, the guy really wasn’t given the best of scripts to work with. The last film was passable, but this one, oh boy, it was not great. I can’t get over how horrific some of it was - and okay, you always expect a few nasty things to happen in a Bond film, but the list was endless.

I was concerned about watching the two Dalton films, mostly because I didn’t know anything about his or Lazenby’s efforts, and the latter wasn’t exactly an outstanding Bond contender. Thankfully, Timothy was a heck of a lot better. He was just as good at hiding his accent as Sean Connery, but made up for it with a stern intensity that Roger Moore had been completely missing.

After some fairly lacklustre Bond efforts recently, this one came storming back with great actors, great action and for once, a pretty solid story! You can sort of tell that Moore is starting to feel a bit old for this one, but soon that is swept aside in favour of an action-packed blockbuster.

I tweeted that Moonraker was the worst Bond film to date, and expected that to be the low point. Sadly, Octopussy plumbed new depths of terrible, but for totally different reasons. Where Moonraker had a rushed plot with laughable ideas, Octopussy felt like it could have been good - but it was all wrong.

This was a much better outing for Bond after the disaster that was Moonraker. It wasn’t one of the best, but felt very much like your standard 007 adventure. I quite liked that he gradually amassed a team around him, so that the final action sequence was a team effort rather than a solo spy mission. The ice skater was a little intense and scary but Topol was fantastic.

I had such high hopes for this one, coming off the back of the fabulous Spy Who Loved Me and having plenty of space action. Sadly, it was easily the worst of the bunch so far. Clearly rushed and thrown together in a hurry (to capitalise on the success of Star Wars), it was disjointed and in many places laughable.

This was by far the best James Bond film to date! Fun from the start, and although it’s a two hour film just like the previous ones, it never felt too long. With submarines as the main plot, I was always going to be a fan, but when you throw in an interesting plot, an underwater car, some foot and car chases around the Egyptian pyramids, and the horror that is Jaws, well there’s very little missing.

I really enjoyed this one. It gets off to a supremely weird start, the chase through the circus only to shoot off the fingers of a James Bond waxwork? Bizarre. But the big showdown is in the same location, so it all coming round in a big circle did make it a nice journey in the end.

Ahhh, our first Roger Moore film and phew! Sean Connery was good but this is Bond as I first saw him. Immediately, everything felt like it had taken a step up in the lightness stakes. From the instant Moore appears, it seems like he’s having more fun with the gig and that really comes across. However, it is a film made in the 70s and that means there are oranges/browns/flares agogo and I hate that.

It was weird, to me, that Sean Connery came back for another film. It’s one thing to be able to compartmentalise, to be able to follow changes in actor when they occur in a series, but it’s another to swap in and out as you feel like it. I was thankful that it was such a good story, though, as it made the transition back to familiarity so much easier!

We’ve gotten into the habit of watching the trailer for the next Bond film after finishing each one, and laughed ourselves silly at the ad for this. All it wanted to do was talk up how DIFFERENT the film was, and boy, they were right.

Now I have an even greater understanding of what Austin Powers is all about. The volcano, the space stuff, the minions on their little buggies, and of course, Blofeld, everything was recognisable, but this time the original concept rather than the spoof. I loved it. Rather than in previous outings, where there have been bizarre directing decisions (sped up footage being the main culprit), this one was all believable, if somewhat Thunderbirds in places.

I really enjoyed this one. I said Goldfinger was the best Bond film of the series up to that point, and I think this one pipped it all over again. There was, perhaps, slightly too much diving, but it was a good story, and the plane stuff was great. I didn’t quite understand all the action at the clinic - it wasn’t clear why people were after Bond when they didn’t know who he was yet. And what happened to that guy in the steam machine - is he still there?

Honor Blackman was so awesome, a feisty pilot with judo skills, taking no nonsense from anyone - it seems completely ridiculous that a quick fumble in the hay with Bond (which was a little bit rapey, it has to be said), would change her mind to such a degree. He’s good, sure, but that good?

The second of the James Bond films clearly had a higher production value than the first, and it felt like it weaved the story better - but unfortunately the story wasn’t as strong as its predecessor. The twists and turns of who is on which side weren’t as interesting as they could have been, but there was far too much opening and closing of doors on the train.

Our ambitious adventure to work through alllll the Bond films begins here, with the first. It was a surprise to me, how good it was. Of its time, naturally, with a slow pace, a couple of questionable effects and some really dodgy audio. But aging aside, it held up. I thought Connery was good, although he’s not my Bond at all.

Just as with the top five songs of the year, Mr C also likes to pass judgement on the movies we have watched over the past twelve months as well. This is a slightly more tricky selection to explain, as we live constantly about four months behind cinema release dates due to the rental window. So, it’s not quite “top five films released in 2013” and it’s not really “top five films watched in 2013” either, it’s more “top five films that were released between August 2012 and August 2013 that we watched in 2013.” But that’s not as catchy.

I don’t remember buying this one but I have recently started getting more interested in the spy game, after reading some Ken Follett wartime adventures. There’s also the whole James Bond romanticism which paints spies in a fantastic, suave and ultimately successful light. This book attempts to tell a more realistic story - the real MI5 and how it came into being, at the hands of one William Melville.

The trailers I am so not sure where I stand on this trailer for Getaway - it looks good and intriguing but I just don’t understand why someone would want someone to drive quite so much. Also, I’m not sure what kind of goody-two-shoes Disney persona Selena ever had, but she’s shedding it quickly.