James Bond and Raymond Benson are back. For Benson, this is his last novel with the character, an adaptation of the 2002 film starring Pierce Brosnan, and the last movie adaptation of a Bond film, though a number of moments and ideas from the Daniel Craig series had their origin in Ian Fleming novels.

The novel opens, much like the film – in fact, the two rarely differ and there isn’t a lot of expansion on characters by Benson though Gustav Graves and his alternate identity are explored a little more – with 007’s sneaking into North Korea. Things go badly, and despite, apparently vanquishing the baddie, Bond is captured and held in a North Korean prison before he finds himself traded for a terrorist named Zao.

M, MI6, and the NSA think that 007 may have broken and given information away, so the NSA demands that MI6 keep Bond on a short leash. But Bond slips his employers and is determined to capture Zao, and learn about the dangerous Gustave Graves’ plans.

He’ll find himself working with, kind of, a NSA agent, Jinx, while trying to discover the source of the mole in MI6, and all of it will lead to a confrontaton with Graves with the safety of the world, once again, hanging in the balance.

Benson’s novels, even his film adaptations, try to walk the line between the literary and the cinematic 007, but this one definitely comes down on the film series side. And while there are litte nods throughout to the franchise, this novel, much like the film itself, isn’t as enjoyable as it could have been. It also seems like a horrible way to send off Brosnan’s Bond, and Benson as Bond scribe.

And you can tell from the way Benson doles out the story that even he thinks some of the over-the-top moments in the film are a little too much. Brosnan gave us an enjoyable Bond, but not all of the stories worked as well as they should have. In the end, this novel ends up being no more than a paint-by-numbers adaptation of the screenplay, and what a horrible way for Benson to end his time writing for 007. I wish he’d delivered one more big, bad-ass tale.

With Benson finishing up his run on the series, that opens the ongoing literary adventures to anyone, and there are some very good authors coming down the line to give us their take on 007. Will they embrace the literary version, the film series, or a combination therein? Will they continue to be set in the modern era or will there be throwbacks to the Bond of the 60s?

Whatever happens, I know one thing, James Bond will return…

… in Devil May Care.