James Bond: The Authorised Biography: A James Bond Adventure

Written by John Pearson

Narrated by David Rintoul

It was a strong face, certainly - the eyes pale grey and very cold, the mouth was hard, the dark hair-grey-streaked now - still fell in the authentic comma over the forehead. This is how John Pearson reacted to his first encounter with the real James Bond, an encounter probably unique in the annals of thriller writing. He went on to write the bestselling authorised biography of Ian Fleming. At the time, like most of the world he assumed that James Bond was nothing more than a character in Fleming's highly charged imagination. Then he began to have his doubts. Doubts which were reaching such a pitch that the British secret service were trying to warn him off the scent. Despite this, he finally became convinced that James Bond was not only real, but actually alive. Thanks to a change in policy within the secret service he was invited to embark upon a companion volume to his life of Fleming. This resulting book must be one of the most extraordinary biographies of our times - the authorised life of a myth, the official biography of James Bond.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ian Fleming Publications
• Release date: Nov 2, 2023
• ISBN: 9781915797216

John Pearson

John Pearson first met Ian Fleming back in 1954 when he was a young journalist, and Fleming, whose career as creator of Agent 007 had barely started, offered him a job as his assistant on the Sunday Times Atticus column. Pearson got to know Fleming well, and after his death in 1964, was commissioned to write what would become his highly successful ‘Authorised Biography of Ian Fleming'. While researching this book, Pearson was struck by the way the character and life of James Bond overlapped with that of his creator, which gave him the idea of writing what become the parallel authorised biography of 007. Since then Pearson wrote many successful biographies, including that of the Kray Twins, the Dukes of Devonshire, the Getty family and the Clermont Club and Lord Lucan. He died in November 2021.