Official YOUNG BOND site gets a makeover

The official Young Bond website youngbond.com has received a spectacular makeover. The all-new site sports a clean contemporary look with links to Young Bond games, downloads, character profiles, and more.

The new site also includes headlines from my sister site The Young Bond Dossier on the main page (via our RSS feed) and in a dedicated news section. This more user friendly site integration is good news for all Young Bond fans as Puffin is planning a full schedule of scoops and exclusives to rollout throughout 2008. That means youngbond.com (via YBD) will always be the first place to find breaking Young Bond news.

Click here to visit the all-new youngbond.com!

LINK: Devil May Care launch day coverage

Click the headline for coverage of Devil May Care's spectacular launch in London, including photos and video, from our friends at Universal Exports.

'DEVIL MAY CARE' ARRIVES!

HURRICANE GOLD paperback released today

Charlie Higson’s fourth Young Bond bestseller Hurricane Gold is released in paperback today (which also happens to be the 100th anniversary of the birth of James Bond creator Ian Fleming).

Even those fans who picked up the hardcover last September will want to grab a copy of the new paperback as it contains an exclusive extract from the next Young Bond novel By Royal Command (due out September 4) and a special five-page preview of SilverFin The Graphic Novel (due out October 2).

Author Charlie Higson will kick off today’s release with an appearance at the Hay Festival in Hay-on-Wye at 2:30. He will then embark on a UK book tour with stops in Bristol, Norwich, Milton Keynes, and Manchester (click for full schedule and store details).

Also to celebrate the release, several UK bookstores will host Young Bond Mini Adventures Challenges (click for details), and Waterstones Picadilly will hold a special Young Bond quiz and costume party today from noon to 4pm.

Today also sees the release of the new adult Bond novel, Devil May Care by Sebastian Faulks.

For young and old...Bond is back!

London calling...

I'm off to London for the big Ian Fleming Centenary week!

On the agenda is a visit to some of the dark corner locations from Double or Die; a photo recon of potential By Royal Command locations in Windsor; Bond exhibits at the Imperial War Museum and the Fleming Gallery; as many Charlie Higson appearances as I can manage; and a VERY special launch party for the centenary novel, Devil May Care, where I will finally be able to meet the kind folks at IFP, Penguin, and Coleman-Getty who have helped so much with this site.

I’m packing my laptop and will try to update the site with any breaking news...but with such a full schedule, expect the bulk of my coverage after my return on June 3.

And if you see a dorky old guy at one of the Young Bond events...say hello, that’s me!

The man with the golden book

A dazzling 24-carat gold-plated copy of Charlie Higson’s fourth Young Bond novel Hurricane Gold was revealed yesterday at a major press event at the Imperial War Museum in London. The event was attended by author Charlie Higson, renowned jeweler Theo Fennell (designer of the Gold Book), and four lucky schoolchildren from nearby Charlotte Sharman School in Lambeth, who got a close-up preview of the gold book before it went into its display case.

The gold book is now a permanent part of the Imperial War Museum’s For Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming & James Bond, and forms an integral part of a special Young Bond trail within the exhibition. The gold book takes its inspiration from the rumored treasure in the story and opens up to reveal an inner compartment with an inlay of ebonised wood, containing a very special secret note from Charlie Higson.

The gold book will also feature as a part of Puffin’s advertising campaign for the paperback edition of Hurricane Gold, due for release on Wednesday, May 28, the centenary of the birth of Ian Fleming.

Bentley Limited Edition Devil May Care

A very special limited edition of Sebastian Faulks' Devil May Care is available for collectors with deep pockets. Limited to only 300 copies, Penguin will release 200 while U.S. publisher Doubleday will release 100. Price: $1500.00.

So what makes this special edition SO special? Check out the clip below.

Starlog reports Oberhauser in BY ROYAL COMMAND

Warning: Nostalgia Alert.

Back before the internet told us, well, everything, the way us rabid fanboys got the latest James Bond news was from Starlog magazine. While Starlog was, technically, a magazine devoted to the Sci-fi genre, it always had a particular fondness for 007, and I can recall with excitement seeing in Starlog the first photos of Roger Moore in A View To A Kill (“He still looks great! Really!”), and Starlog’s famous Moore/Connery cover (right) was the opening salvo of 1983’s “Battle of the Bonds.”

That’s why it’s a pleasure to report that the current issue of Starlog (#366) contains a Young Bond scoop (of sorts). The main feature is a very fine interview with Samantha Weinberg, author of sister series The Moneypenny Diaries (which is just being released in the U.S.), but in a smaller article about the other 2008 Bond releases, there’s this little gem about Young Bond 5:

“Meanwhile, Charlie Higson is expected to accomplish his mission by delivering his fifth and final Young Bond novel, By Royal Command, for publication in September. This story features Hannes Oberhauser, Bond’s skiing and climbing teacher, and an important figure during his adolescence -- one whose murder, decades later, 007 avenges in Octopussy.”

For the record, we actually got this news from Charlie and first reported it here, so it’s possible we are the source for Starlog. But, hey, this is still cool news that’s worth repeating, and I love the idea that fans who don’t obsessively follow all the latest news on the net will discover this choice bit of By Royal Command coolness the way we did back in the day...in Starlog!

SilverFin The Graphic Novel

Cover art for the highly anticipated SilverFin graphic novel, due for release in the UK on October 2, 2008, has been revealed on The Young Bond Dossier.

SilverFin: The Graphic Novel is written by Young Bond author Charlie Higson and illustrated by renowned artist Kev Walker. Based on the bestselling first Young Bond novel, this graphic novel adaptation will run 160 pages with approximately 300 full color illustrations.

SilverFin: The Graphic Novel can be pre-ordered now at Amazon.co.uk.

Win a crocodile!

To celebrate the release this month of Charlie Higson’s fourth Young Bond novel Hurricane Gold in paperback, Puffin is giving fans a chance to adopt a genuine West African Dwarf Crocodile from the Whipsnade Zoo!

Click below for details and entry form at the official Puffin website.