I rewatched the Sean Connery film after finishing this and OMG, the book is soooo much better!! As I have mentioned in my reviews of some of the previous Bond books, the character in Fleming's original books is much more 3-dimensional and to my mind at least, more interesting.

The plot of the movie has only parts of the plot from the book & makes much less sense. ( )

Again, a lot more of the blah blah blah than the action. I’m really disappointed with this series. ( )

Holds together pretty well. And Domino is a strong woman character. ( )

This is the novel that Ian Fleming wrote with Kevin McCrory and you can see some very different influences with regards to the plotting and the nature of the threat that faces 007. He’s first foray into alternative medicine in a rather quack like clinic in Sussex varies between tense and at times amusing. This might be the first time that literary James Bond actually uses humour. The Bahamas sections and in particular the development of Emile Largo and Domino never feels quite as fleshed out as normal. Stavro Blofeld is more of the ultimate villain. This is of course the start of the so-called Blofeld trilogy. Highly recommended. ( )

Thunderball (1961) (Bond #9) by Ian Fleming. This book has nothing to do with the Thunderball mentioned in Live And Let Die, although most of the locations are near to the sights used in the previous book. This time Bond and Felix Leiter are after stolen atomic bombs around the Bahamas. There is no hope of finding the damned things as the group responsible the the theft of the plane carrying them is S.P.E.C.T.R.E. This is a new collection of the most evil of men headed by Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the worst, or most brilliant, of the lot. Blofeld’s plan has the world’s security services mystified as to where the stolen plane, and the bombs, have ended up and where the latter items are to be used.
Given just a week to come up with the $100,000,000 ransom, the U.S. and Great Britain are at a loss. Bond knows his assignment is a wild goose chase but he follows orders anyway. And then he meets Domino with her saucy gondolier’s hat and things start to tumble together.
This is yet another in the brilliant line of espionage books penned by Fleming. Bond is his usual stubborn self, unwilling to disobey all his orders, but able to sniff out the unusual where others might not. Largo is the fiend running the operation, and the plan it so well designed that even when Bond knows what is to happen, there is not one shred of proof that Largo, and the ship Disco Volante are not what they claim to be, merely hunting a lost pirate treasure.
Things get dire very rapidly, Bond and Leiter almost give up hope, but, being who and what they are, they persevere.
An exciting and riveting story from the master. Do not skip over this lightly. ( )