Role of Honour

Written by John Gardner

Narrated by Simon Vance

“People notice things and word around Whitehall is that Commander Bond is living a shade dangerously—gambling, the new Bentley, er…ladies, money changing hands.…”

Following scandal and his shock resignation from Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, James Bond becomes a gun for hire; able, and willing, to sell his lethal skills to the highest bidder. And SPECTRE, it seems, are eager to have the disgraced British super spy on their payroll.

But before he can be fully embraced by his new employer—and deadliest enemy—007 must first prove his loyalty. And in doing so he must threaten with nuclear annihilation everything he has fought his whole life to defend. Until honor is fully restored.…

Gardner’s stunning reinvention of Bond secured critical acclaim and blockbusting sales around the world. Role of Honour, the fourth book in the series, kept 007 at No.1.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brilliance Audio
• Release date: Oct 27, 2015
• ISBN: 9781511306850

John Gardner

John Gardner (1933–1982) was born in Batavia, New York. His critically acclaimed books include the novels Grendel, The Sunlight Dialogues, and October Light, for which he received the National Book Critics Circle Award, as well as several works of nonfiction and criticism such as On Becoming a Novelist. He was also a professor of medieval literature and a pioneering creative writing teacher whose students included Raymond Carver and Charles Johnson.

Reviews for Role of Honour

[Jeff Wybo · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great work, JG ! Always love re-reading this one. Love the Gardner Novels.

[johnfishlock · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Pretty good read. Interesting hearing about technology from the early 80s' 4.2

[alanteder · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This is in the 2 star "it was ok" category.With the recent announcement of the Bond24 "SPECTRE" movie, it seemed like a good time to go back for a sampling of the old Bond books. John Gardner's "Role of Honour" was the 4th in his extension of the series and either 19th overall (if, as in Goodreads, you don't count Christopher Wood's 2 movie novelizations that followed Kingley Amis' "Colonel Sun" which was No. 15 after Ian Fleming's canon of 14 works) or 21st (as in LibraryThing, if you do count them)."Role of Honour" is in fact (mild spoiler) a SPECTRE novel with the reborn terror organization revealed with a new leader towards the end. Ernst Stavro Blofeld however has no need to worry about his top standing in the world of Bond villains as his replacement doesn't leave much of an impression.The conventions of the canon are mostly adhered to: a briefing by M, a briefing on weaponry (but in this case, a crash course in programming & microcomputers in the stone-age of the early 1980's, by an ally and not by Q Branch), ridiculous names for the villain and female allies, the hidden lair of the villain, a game-like confrontation with the villain (a war-game simulation in this case and not a game of chance), attacks by various minions on the way, the reveal of the evil plot, and the final confrontation. The formula is tired of course, but when you go back to the Fleming books it was always made to work with its fetishizing of equipment and its tricks-of-the-spy-trade knowledge. "Role of Honour" just doesn't have that sort of spark, maybe because of the dry computer-simulation related story, but especially because the final evil plot (involving a blimp) just seems so comparatively low tech. It was still interesting to read as a comparison to the Fleming originals and with its attempt to keep the series current and relevant to the (then) high-tech computer world of the 1980s.