Ranking James Bond Authors
6. William Boyd
Tenure – 2013, Novels –
1, Short Stories – 0
The yo-yoing setting of Bond returned the character to the sixties when William Boyd assumed the penmanship of the series in 2013. Well versed in espionage, period and crime fiction (and having included Ian Fleming as an actual character in a World War II novel), he seemed a better fit for the series than his predecessor Jeffrey Deaver, but would be the third successive author to release just a single novel, making Solo an ironic title.
Set in a thinly-veiled allegory of Nigeria during the 1969 Civil War that resulted in the failed secession of Biafra, Solo is excessively convoluted and considerably hamstrung by a fairly weak and one-dimensional villain more akin to the henchmen seen in previous stories than a memorable antagonist in his own right, but is serviceable enough as an ‘airport novel’. Boyd’s depiction of a middle-aged Bond (he is explicitly noted to be 45) is quite well-crafted, with the limitations of age on the character’s usual superheroics providing an interesting dimension.
Ultimately, however, Solo sold poorly and has become a forgotten anomaly within the collection of books, with Boyd moving on from it to build his portfolio further in non-literary worlds such as television and theatre.