More James Bond Collectables

Here's some recent additions to my James Bond collection.

The first is a 7 inch vinyl single of Rita Coolidge performing "All Time High".  This was the theme song for the 1983 Bond film "Octopussy" starring Roger Moore and Maud Adams.   Last November I purchased a 7 inch single of the rival (non-EON) Bond film from the same year, "Never Say Never Again" performed by Lani Hall.  I'm very pleased to now have both of these singles in my vinyl collection.

The second addition is a dust wrapper for the UK book club edition (BCE) of Ian Fleming's "Thunderball" published in 1961.  Another Australian Bond collector had this dust wrapper for sale and I quickly snapped it up.  I have several BCE copies of "Thunderball" however one was damaged by silverfish a few years ago, so now I have a replacement copy.  Hopefully silverfish won't damage this wrapper as well.

New Secondhand Bookshop Open

It's not uncommon for me to write about an oft visited book store that has just permanently closed.  So it was great to recently discover a new secondhand book shop in Prahran.

Snailfish Independent Book Store on Greville Street, just off Chapel, has been trading for a few months now.   I spoke to the owner, Nathan, and he was very enthusiastic about his books and business.  He explained that he plans to concentrate on stocking political, art and fiction titles while also saving books from ending up in landfill.

After a brief chat I had a wander through the two rooms of book shelves.  I managed to find two Ian Fleming titles, a nice Pan Books - Raymond Hawkey series copy of "Thunderball" from the 1960's and a 2019 copy of "Casino Royale" from Arcturus Publishing Group. 

I wish Nathan every success with Snailfish and I plan to visit again soon.

The James Bond Collection Boxset

In 2019, Arcturus Publishing Group in the UK released a set of five Ian Fleming - James Bond titles for the Canadian market.  I managed to purchase these five books last year however the set also came with a slipcase which had evaded me.  A few weeks ago a friend of mine in New Zealand, John F, messaged saying he'd acquired a spare set of these books still in its slipcase and asked if I wanted to buy it from him.  The set arrived in the post a couple of weeks ago.

I'm still unclear on the logic behind the five titles included in the set as Ian Fleming's James Bond novels were published annually.  The original publication dates of these five novels are: 1953 ("Casino Royale"), 1954 ("Live And Let Die"), 1957 ("From Russia, With Love"), 1959 ("Goldfinger") and 1961 ("Thunderball") so as you can see they're pretty random titles.  Perhaps they were deemed the most iconic Bond titles, or perhaps the favourite five of the person who was asked to select them.  Who knows ?

But it's the slipcase I was really after, and it looks pretty cool.  Among the images there's even the silhouette of Daniel Craig from the "Casino Royale" film poster of 2006.

Here's a couple more photos of the boxset:

And finally, here's the ISBN for anyone else trying to hunt down this set: 9781789506624. Thanks again John, much appreciated.

Five Canadian Bond Novels Arrive

Ian Fleming's literary works entered the public domain in Canada in 2015.  In most countries this copyright exists until 2034, but in Canada it's possible to re-publish all of the James Bond novels without owing any royalties to the copyright owners.

To my knowledge only five Ian Fleming titles have been re-printed in Canada since 2015, and today I received copies of them, sourced by a fellow Bond book collector.  The titles are "Casino Royale", "Live And Let Die", "From Russia, With Love", "Goldfinger" and "Thunderball" and were published by Arcturus Publishing Group in 2019.

The covers are uniform in design and while the artist/designer is not credited I think they've done a pretty good job.  Hopefully the other nine will also be printed soon.

Ps. It's about time I had some new James Bond covers to add to www.PizGloria.com !

"The Spectre Trilogy" Slipcase Arrives

Today I received "The Spectre Trilogy" slipcase in the mail containing the three Ian Fleming novels featuring the fictional "criminal organisation" Spectre.  Published by Vintage Books, this James Bond box set was released around the same time as last years Daniel Craig film of the same name.  It is as close to a movie tie-in for the last Bond film as we are ever likely to get.  Fortunately the parcel was well packaged too after its journey from the UK.

My Wife Finds A Gem

My wife travelled to Hobart on Wednesday for work.  She had a very busy two days but fortunately for me she had enough spare time during one of her lunch breaks to visit a book store on my behalf.  Cracked And Spineless is one of my favourite secondhand book stores in Tassie and always has a few James Bond books on its shelves.

On the day my wife visited there were several Ian Fleming novels on the shelves.  So she sent me a photo and then a call.

For some reason I didn't receive the photo immediately so she ran through them over the phone. I kept saying "Yep, got that" and "Got that"... But when she mentioned the "Thunderball" movie tie-in and said it was in really good condition I knew it must be great.

So she bought it for me and here it is.  Pan Books, 14th printing, 1965 and looking as square and bright as the day it was published.  The spine is perfect as the book has never been read.  Definitely a gem of a copy, thanks to my fantastic wife.

Ps. Yes, I did check for a copy of the Domino letter but it's absent.  However it was only an after-thought anyway