‘Moonraker’ novel worth a second look

When I was in high school, one of the most popular novelists was Ian Fleming . Even the kids who didn’t otherwise do their homework could be seen carrying around tattered paperback copies of “Dr. No” of “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.”

Though I liked the films as much as anyone, mainly because of Sean Connery , I never really got the books. They seemed too dense, too lacking in the style of the films.

Of course, the early films, whether by Terence Young or Guy Hamilton or Lewis Gilbert, were far less flashy than those that would come – the ones starring Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan. But even the first four or five were far different from the books that inspired them.

One I recently listened to, courtesy of Spokane Public Library , on CD is “Moonraker,” the 1955 novel that was made by Gilbert and starred Moore, and the two couldn’t be more different. Where the film is outlandish and sci-fi ridiculous, the novel is far more down to earth and, in its better moments, even approaches being art.

It boasts, of course, the attitudes toward women as brilliant, sexy creatures that is both sexist and prescient at the same time – predating today’s attitudes of “kicking ass and looking good” that you’ll find in “Xena: Warrior Princess” and the movies of Robert Rodriguez .

But Bond, at least in “Moonraker,” doesn’t go around bedding every woman he meets. He might want to, and he certainly does harbor lust in his heart. But unlike the movie Bond, the novel’s hero is far more human.

And I mean that in a good way.

Below: The original trailer for 1979’s “Moonraker.”