The 18th Century pirate Captain Morgan left a vast amount of treasure in the Caribbean. James Bond has been tasked with finding who is dripping the gold doubloons into the US economy. His quest quickly reunites him with Felix Leiter and leads them to The Big Man in Harlem and the beautiful Solitaire, a tarot reader and psychic.
Live and Let Die is the second Bond book that Ian Fleming wrote. A quick look at the reviews on GoodReads reveals that is one of the most polarising, Many readers complain that it racist and mysogonistic while others say that you have to make allowances for the times it was written in.
For me, the racist elements were hard to turn a blind eye to (and, of course). But I’m reading these stories to see whether they work as entertainments, so will keep my comments to the entertainment value of the story. Connecting both, I would say that I always find authors’ attempts to write excessively in a character’s dialect to be tedious – and this was no exception. Fleming’s attempts to capture Black Harlem speech is tiresome and unnecessary.
Solitaire’s character is somewhat one-dimensional. Vesper in Casino Royale seemed (while not exactly 3D) to be a more rounded character.
Bond’s relationship with Felix is interesting – it’s good to see he can make friends and isn’t just the loner he appeared to be in Casino Royale. Felix’s fate in this book made me genuinely sad for him, and I liked Bond’s reaction to it.
There are some terrific action sequences. In particular the scene in the fish warehouse, but I also enjoyed Bond’s escape from the Big Man’s lair in Harlem, which showed his lethal capabilities. The Big Man’s method for killing Bond and Solitaire seemed somewhat convoluted, but I guess that’s always part of the fun of the villains in these stories.
All in all, this is an enjoyable book, but at times an uncomfortable read due to the outdated attitudes.
Rating: 75%
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