Literawiki
Register
Advertisement
7d2Xp6pSf4rxV1R0y5R0ukV3iP0

A Casino Royale paperback by Penguin Books in 2001.

Casino Royale is the first 007 novel by the British author Ian Fleming. It was written in 1952 and published by Jonathan Cape Co. in 1953. Fleming typed it on his golden typewrite inside his Jamaican estate, Goldeneye. The book, along with several others in the series, was based on his wartime experiences at the Naval Intelligence Division in World War II. This is clearly shown in Casino Royale in the major gambling scene in which James Bond takes on the main villain Le Chiffre. The scene was based on a real life episode when Fleming tried to strip a group of Nazis of their funds which turned out to be unsuccessful at all three attempts. The game was baccarat.

The book was an astonishing success selling over 8 million copies in the UK alone. It was given positive reception among the general public and critics alike and sold out in the UK, although sales went much slower in the US. This paved the way for new Bond novels and a big movie franchise to come out, including two movie adaptations (one official and the other unofficial) and one television adaptation of Casino Royale alone.

The next novel in the series is Live and Let Die, which was first published in 1954.

Plot[]

138730bc96e574eaffc386cb6a7ca7b4

The baccarat table in Royale-les-Eaux.

On his first mission, agent 007 James Bond is tasked to bankrupt a man who goes by the name of Le Chiffre at a casino in the French resort of Royale-les-Eux. Le Chiffre is a paymaster of a Soviet Organization called SMERSH. If Bond can ruin his reputation at the baccarat table, Le Chiffre's Soviet spymasters will be forced to retire him as a result. During his mission Bond meets René Mathis, an intelligence Operative working for the French secret service, the Deuxième Bureau, and Vesper Lynd, an agent of MI6's Station S with whom he soon falls in love. Finally he meets Felix Leiter, a CIA Agent from Texas. Bond will have to go through a lot of trouble with the paymaster in order to complete the mission and save Lynd, especially after Le Chiffre loses the game of baccarat in the final round to Bond.

External links[]

Advertisement