Great news today! K1Bond007.com reports that Pegasus Books will re-publish a selection of Raymond Benson's James Bond novels in an omnibus edition in October 2008.The collection will contain the "Union Trilogy"-- High Time To Kill, Doubleshot, and Never Dream of Dying... plus, as a bonus, the complete uncut short story Blast From The Past.
Blast From The Past originally appeared in the January 1997 issue of Playboy in a truncated version (image right). The full-length version was published in Italian and in French. This will be its first appearance in English.
Raymond will provide a new introduction to the book. A title for the collection has not yet been selected. Pegasus hopes to publish a second volume of Benson's remaining 007 novels and short stories in 2009.
Thanks, Zencat! Fantastic news! I've been hoping that Benson and Gardner's work would end up back on the shelves in omnibus form. I really hope that second volume happens, and includes the rest of the stories as well. I know Benson's pretty down on it, but I wish he'd change his mind about "The Undertaker's Wind" and allows that to be included too... (I know IFP would have to have a say also.) Even if it's presented as an early draft or an abandonned work or something.
ReplyDeleteIt would be great if they did something similar for Kingsley Amis's three Bond books. Are there perhaps any such news?
ReplyDeleteKingsley Amis wrote three books?! I thought it was just the one.
ReplyDeleteCorrect. Amis only wrote one book, Colonel Sun.
ReplyDeleteHe wrote three Bond books. From his wikipedia entry:
ReplyDelete1965 - The James Bond Dossier
1965 - The Book of Bond, or Every Man His Own 007 (as Bill Tanner)
1968 - Colonel Sun: a James Bond Adventure - (as Robert Markham)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingsley_Amis
Oh, right, he did write three 007 related books, but only one (Colonel Sun) is a novel. I was only thinking fiction. Sorry.
ReplyDeleteBut, yeah, an omnibus of those three Amis books could be cool.