FOR FLEMING AND COUNTRY as it is announced that Young Bond author Charlie Higson is to mark the seventieth anniversary of Casino Royale, the birth of Bond and King Charles III’s coronation with a brand new and wholly contemporary Bond story, On His Majesty’s Secret Service.
Managing director of Ian Fleming Publications Corinne Turner rightly notes how “the coronation of King Charles III is a momentous occasion for the country .We asked ourselves how we at Ian Fleming Publications could celebrate it, and the answer seemed obvious. Ian Fleming’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service was first published on April 1 1963. What better way, 60 years on, to mark this new chapter in history than with a brand new story: On His Majesty’s Secret Service?’ She continues, “we shared our thoughts with Charlie, and he was delighted to take on the challenge of writing a Bond adventure in time for publication in May.”
That was only a month for Higson to complete his mission, but the invite to enter Bond’s literary world once more was too enticing.
“When Ian Fleming Publications came to me with the idea of writing an adult Bond story a little more than a month ago I was thrilled’, notes Higson. ‘Until I realised it had to be ready for the coronation in May. Getting it written and turned around in such a short space of time was going to be as tense and heart-pounding as any Bond mission. Although, of course, nobody would actually be shooting at me.’
All proceeds from the new work will go to the National Literacy Trust.
It is the 4th of May, two days before the Coronation of King Charles III and the world’s favourite spy has his work cut out for him. Bond is sent at the last minute to thwart an attempt to disrupt the Coronation by the wealthy, eccentric and self-styled Athelstan of Wessex, who is on a deadly mission of his own to teach the United Kingdom a lesson. Can Bond dismantle his shady plans and defeat his privately hired team of mercenaries?
IAN FLEMING PUBLICATIONS LTD.
“I’ve been thinking about writing an adult Bond adventure ever since working on the Young Bond books, and he came bursting out of me with both fists flying. It was all I could do to keep up with him and get his story down on paper. Fleming famously wrote fast, and I channelled that energy. And now it’s so exciting for me to finally enter the world of grown-up Bond. Everything you want from a Bond story is in there – sex, violence, cars, a colourful villain with a nasty henchman, and of course, Bond himself. So well-known and yet so unknowable.”
charlie higson
ON HIS MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE
by Charlie Higson
Ian Fleming Publications Ltd.144 pages
Published on May 4 2023
Hardback / e-book / audionbook (read by Charlie Higson)
To order your copies click here.
