Deaver going Down Under

Carte Blanche author Jeffery Deaver's Australia book tour appearances have been announced on his official website:

Thursday July 14, 2011, Brisbane, Australia
Dymocks on Albert, Brisbane
12:00pm, Free
Venue: In-store Signing, 177 Albert St
Bookings/ Enquiries: (07) 3007 2800 or brisbaneadmin@dymocks.com.au

Thursday July 14, 2011, Perth, Australia CANCELLED
The West Australian Events Program & Dymocks Present Jeffery Deaver
Venue: Burswood Entertainment Complex, 7.00pm - 10:00pm
Tickets: Three course dinner with beverages $140 or dinner and book $163 (incl GST.) Tables of 8 available.
Bookings: 9482 3820 or events@wanews.com.au
Information: thewest.com.au/events

Friday July 15, 2011, Melbourne, Australia
Dymocks Melbourne
6.30pm
Information: 03 9660 8500 or levents@dymocks.com.au
Venue: In-store, Dymocks Melbourne, 234 Collins St, Melbourne VIC 3000

Monday July 18, 2011, Sydney, Australia
Dymocks & Sydney Morning Herald Literary Lunch
Venue: Four Seasons Hotel, 191 George Street Sydney
Cost: $70 members SMH Dymocks Events, $85 non-members. Includes a two course meal and all beverages.
Bookings/ Enquiries: Phone (02) 9449 4366

THE BOOK BOND REVIEWS

Over the past few weeks I've been gathering the various reviews I've written over the years from my old Young Bond website, CBn, and Amazon, and relocating them here under a common tag: BOOK BOND REVIEW.

So if you'd like to revisit reviews of the Young Bond novels, a Moneypenny Diary, a few Benson titles, and even my review of the film Casino Royale (it was a book adaptation, afterall), just click on the BOOK BOND REVEW tag and enjoy.

Brosnan the bearded Bond

Here's a wild Bond cover you've never seen. Because it was never actually used. This is a prototype cover for the UK paperback edition of John Gardner's GoldenEye novelization (from my own collection). The photo used here was Pierce Brosnan's first publicity shot as 007. At the time, he was filming Robinson Crusoe, hence the beard and long hair. Pretty cool, eh? Ironically, Brosnan would end his tenure as Bond sporting a very similar look in Die Another Day.

One thing I really like about this cover is the fact that it fits in with the James Bond series design of the time. When the novelization was finally released in November 1995, the final cover was not in this style. That's also a very early version of the GoldenEye logo.

Link: The CARTE BLANCHE cocktail

Summer Fruit Cup has the recipe for "the Carte Blanche cocktail" as described in the new Bond novel by Jeffery Deaver. Just click the headline above to get the mix. Bottoms up!

The Christopher Wood hardcovers

Recently there has been discussion on the CBn forums about these two books, so I thought I'd post them here for those that have never seen them (or even knew that they existed). What you see here are UK hardcover editions of the two novelizations of the Roger Moore classics, The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979). These were written by screenwriter Christopher Wood, and actually carry variant titles, James Bond, the Spy Who Love Me and James Bond and Moonraker -- probably to differentiate them from the original Fleming books.

While these were also released as tie-in paperbacks with movie poster art, Jonathan Cape published these now exceedingly rare hardcover editions with moody jacket art by Bill Botten, who would later do artwork for John Gardner's For Special Services and Icebreaker. What's nice is the books themselves are the same size as the Fleming hardcovers (and Colonel Sun), so they look terrific on the shelf.

They are also darn good books.