I had this book sitting on my shelf for a few years, having picked it up on the supercheap at a used book shop, but sadly did not get around to reading it until last summer, just after Mr. Gardner passed away. I read the novel in tribute, even if the man himself felt it was "the weakest so far" when asked about his Bond series at the time of Role of Honor’s release.

Now, before we go any further, everybody already knows that John Gardner was no Ian Fleming, but that doesn’t mean the man wasn’t a talented novelist in his own right. Granted, we’re not discussing his non-007 books here, but I feel Gardner’s series of Bond novels are nowhere near as bad as some would have you believe. They’re certainly a class above the mostly dreadful books penned by Raymond Benson. This novel in particular is nice, light-hearted entertainment if you ask me. If you’re a fan of literary 007, you should at least check out one or two of the Gardners before deciding they’re complete rubbish.

Role of Honor has a rather intriguing premise, which has a hint of the film License to Kill about it (approximately six years before the film came out, too). Bond falls out of favor with his dubious superiors at MI-6 after receiving a rather substantial inheritance, which causes accusations of improprieties and unacceptable behavior. Sacked rather ungraciously, Bond turns to a life of gambling and skulduggery in the hopes of attracting a freelance outfit to work for. His wish is granted when representatives from his old enemy, SPECTRE, come out of the woodwork seeking Bond’s services. Although SPECTRE is also rather skeptical of Bond’s true colors, after running him through a terrorist training camp in the Middle East, they believe their new man has the right stuff to carry out missions for them.

Of course, it’s all an elaborate ruse designed to sneak Britain’s top agent behind enemy lines. I’m not spoiling anything by giving that away, either. It’s pretty much spelled out from chapter two onwards.

The novel sees Bond, James Bond, our man of action and excitement, turn into a complete nerd by becoming a hacker, playing computer war simulations, and taking up role-playing games. No, I’m serious! The original scene in the novel was intended to feature Bond battling one of the villains in a computer war simulation, but the publishers caught wind that a similar scene was to be featured in the upcoming ‘rival’ Bond film, Never Say Never Again (a rather poor remake of Thunderball starring a returning Sean Connery that went up against the ‘official’ Bond movie that year, Roger Moore’s Octopussy). Long story short, the publishers petitioned Gardner to change the scene, so Bond and the baddie end up playing a hybrid of role-playing game and war game, recreating the battle of Bunker Hill with toy soldiers. And you thought all he did was stand around drinking martinis and snogging babes in casinos!

The villains are not too bad, I suppose. We have a computer genius who defected from the Pentagon and an Arab electronics millionaire who has taken the reigns of SPECTRE. Their plan is to use computers to knock out America’s nuclear power. Sounds ridiculous, but believe me, they do have a pretty cunning way of doing this. The novel deals with two of the hot button issues in the global consciousness circa 1983/84, that of computers and nuclear power. It’s quite charming actually, in that all the 'cutting-edge' computer technology described by Gardner here is so woefully out of date nowadays, a younger person reading this book would have incredulous looks on their faces as they read about 5 1/4 disks that had a whopping capacity of 360 KB.

For the action junkies, there are a few decent sequences of maximum carnage, including one where our man takes down a team of heavily armed masked terrorists armed only with an ASP pistol. The climax of the novel was completely ripped off by the producers of the film series for 1985’s A View to a Kill, the only difference is the Goodyear blimp is flying over San Francisco instead of Berne, Switzerland like in Role of Honor. And I suppose it’s fair to say the computer technology obsessed main villain is also a precursor to the same movie, although not quite as camp as Christopher Walken.

Worth the read if you’re a big time 007 fan, or if you’re just jonesing for some memories from the era when DOS was the operating system of choice. ( )