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| Moonraker (James Bond Novels) | 
 enlarge | Author: Ian Fleming
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Category: Book
List Price: $14.00
Buy New: $3.94
You Save: $10.06 (72%)
New (30) Used (23) from $3.74
Avg. Customer Rating:  62 reviews
Sales Rank: 5893
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5 x 0.5
ISBN: 0142002062
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.914
EAN: 9780142002063
ASIN: 0142002062
Publication Date: December 31, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: SATISFACTION GUARANTEED! NEW Book! May have remainder mark. Most orders ship within 1 BUSINESS DAY with ORDER CONFIRMATION.
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Product Description
Moonraker, Britain's new ICBM-based national defense system, is ready for testing, but something's not quite right. At M's request, Bond begins his investigation with Sir Hugo Drax, the leading card shark at M's club, who is also the head of the Moonraker project. But once Bond delves deeper into the goings-on at the Moonraker base, he discovers that both the project and its leader are something other than they appear to be.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 57 more reviews...
 A bit disappointing August 14, 2008
This is only the second Bond book I've read recently, the other being Doctor No (James Bond Novels) (Although I've read one, One Her Majestys' secret Service, I think, many years ago). It didn't live up to my expectations. It's a short novel, but the pace is still slow, and not until the last third or so does it become suspenseful. I liked Dr. No better than this one and I would guess there are other better Bond novels.
Best Of The First Three June 16, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Well I was ready to hate Moonraker because of the movie. So if you hated the movie...try the book. It isn't campy with the Space Shuttle at all. It has a rocket as the object, but it really isn't about that. The beginning part of the book is about cards. I loved it. However it starts getting bogged down in the middle section and then like all Ian Fleming books it wraps up really quick. I just felt the ending was just too contrived. I liked it because I was prepared to hate it, but it's still not that great. It's the best of the first three but that's not saying much. I would recommend it just for the beginning section because it shows how James Bond thinks and rationalizes things. Plus he doesn't get the girl at all in this book.
 Solid-fuel thrills May 14, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
While I always knew that many films of the James Bond series drifted into camp and outright cheesiness, I never realized how much of a disservice some of them did to the source material until I read the novels. And wow--Moonraker in particular, while one of the better '70s entries in the film series, bears no relation to the gritty homeland security thriller written by Ian Fleming.
The titular Moonraker is an missile designed by British hero Sir Hugo Drax. Drax's invention is set to thrust Britain into the forefront of the Cold War arms race--with the Moonraker, the British will be able to target any European capital with a rocket capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. When the novel begins--on Monday--the Moonraker is set to be tested in just a few days--Friday, when a missile carrying a dummy warhead will be fired into the North Sea. Security is tight on the project--British prestige is at stake.
But 007's boss has other things on his mind. Drax is a fellow member of Blades, a gambling club, and M is convinced that Drax cheats. At bridge. Since Bond is between missions at the time, M drags him along to a late-night game of bridge, where Bond outfoxes Drax to the tune of 15,000. Unbeknowst to them, the same night one of Drax's subordinates was killed by a German engineer in a murder-suicide.
Mere hours after fleecing Drax at the cardtable, Bond is sent to him as a replacement. It seems the murdered man had misgivings about the security of Drax's project, and with so much at stake and so little time on hand, the Ministry of Defense wants no mistakes. Things are not, of course, what they seem, and it soon becomes apparent that the Moonraker is in the hands of madmen.
Like the Bond film, there is a certain measure of predictability about the whole proceeding; of course Bond will live, of course he will save Britain. Unlike the film, Fleming's novel has Bond make all-too-human mistakes, get battered and bruised, and even--spoiler alert--get rejected by the girl. And the novel moves so briskly, investing each and every point of the plot with tension and suspense, that even the mystifying bridge game at the beginning is exciting. Moonraker is pure entertainment.
Highly recommended.
 Never Trust A Card Cheat April 28, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Hugo Drax is not in the first line of 007 arch-villains, and the plot of "Moonraker" likewise is not one of the most exciting James Bond yarns in the original run of novels by Ian Fleming. Yet both manage their moments of squirmy pleasure.
Bond encounters Drax first at a posh British gaming club, to which Bond's boss M belongs. Drax is England's hero of the hour, as he's building Great Britain's first nuclear rocket. But M suspects Drax is cheating at cards, and sets Bond against him in a game that ends unhappily for the rocket builder. Bond then finds himself pulled into Drax's orbit again when murder calls at Drax's rocket base. "HELL IS HERE" warns a flashing neon sign, and so it is.
Published in 1955, this third entry in the 007 series gets off to a leisurely start. We meet Bond in a typical light day at the office, practicing at the pistol range, reading dull reports, thinking about lunch. It's an arresting portrait of a superhero struggling with ennui and a sense of purposelessness. He wonders almost forlornly if he'll make it to 45.
The entrance of Drax, a red-whiskered dynamo with a fierce temper, shakes Bond out of his rut by plunging him into that most exciting of espionage activities, high-stakes bridge. It's a masterful sequence by Fleming, in large part because he doesn't stop and explain how bridge works. Fleming goes from strength to strength introducing us to the title figure, the rocket Drax proposes to send off in a test launch that will culminate in a splashdown in the North Sea...well, according to some figures.
"There the gleaming rocket stood, beautiful, innocent, like a new toy for Cyclops," Fleming writes. "But there was a horrible smell of chemicals in the air and to Bond the Moonraker was a giant hypodermic needle ready to be plunged into the heart of England."
That's a good foretaste of the masterful build-up Fleming creates, offering a bit more mystery than the usual Bond thriller. The resolution is where the novel pulls up short. Fleming doesn't do enough to throw you off the right scent, to the point you wonder why Bond can't add up two and two. There's another damsel-in-distress car chase straight out of "Casino Royale", and even an Austin Powers-style "My Fiendish Scheme" dissertation from the villain. The Soviets put in a totally unnecessary appearance.
"Moonraker" can still be safely recommended to the Bond novice. It's a fun ride with a lot of unusual angles. Certainly it wasn't spoiled by the film of the same name, and Fleming handles the novel's locale (southern England entirely) with his usual gimlet eye. You stride with Bond inside a century-old London club, walk along the white cliffs and smell the salt air. There's even a romantic subplot with a capable British policewoman that has a resolution quite unique for the Bond series, and wonderful for the way it gives you a glimpse of Bond's deepest self.
"The gain to the winner is always less than the loss to the loser" is how Bond thinks of life. "Moonraker" gives you an idea what he means; an enjoyable one all the same.
It's Not The Movie April 22, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've been reading all the Fleming James Bond novels in order, and so far this one is my favorite. It stands out for a couple reasons:
1) Bond never goes to outer space.
2) I won't spoil it for you, but something about the epilogue is unexpected, and sets the James Bond character of the books apart from the James Bond character of the movies. I was completely surprised, and it really rounded out the character and made him more human.
The adventure itself is fun. Tropical locale with a beautiful female companion--it's hard to get tired of stuff like that. But what I do get tired of is Bond being sent to beat some villain at gambling. He just did that in "Casino Royale," and it didn't sound like government work to me then, either.
Still, the rest of the plot is fun, and Bond's victory at the end is not without cost. Rather than portraying him as the super-spy of the movies who dashes around unscathed no matter what's going on around him, he gets pretty messed up. (And no, that's not the epilogue surprise I was talking about earlier.)
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