What do you think?
Rate this book
The Ian Fleming Files
Before James Bond there was Commander Ian Fleming or '17F' as he was known during World War 2 when the young British author served as an intelligence officer in Great Britain's Naval Intelligence Department.
In his startling debut novel, Ian Fleming scholar and screenwriter of upcoming movie Fleming Damian Stevenson has crafted the ultimate origin story for one of popular culture's most beloved icons.
Everything that inspired the James Bond books is here: the suave and ruthless central character, his demanding boss, a bevy of beautiful femme fatales, formidable villains bent on world domination, their homicidal henchmen, exotic locations, crackling wit and all the cool cars, sleek guns, ingenious gadgets and monstrous hardware one would expect to see lavishly featured in a gonzo story about the author of Casino Royale, Live and Let Die, Moonraker, The Spy Who Loved Me, From Russia With Love, Diamonds Are Forever, Goldfinger, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, You Only Live Twice and The Man With The Golden Gun.
James Bond was born from the ashes of World War 2 and The Ian Fleming Files: Operation Armada is all the more powerful for its attention to historical reality. This is no flight of fancy. The book has been lauded by Bond experts for the way in which it convincingly takes us inside Ian Fleming's mind as he executes the dangerous missions that inspired his best selling books.
Damian Stevenson researched his novel for six years, interviewing hundreds of people connected to Ian Fleming's life and reading everything ever written about him. The result is an instant classic that will appeal to Bond fans and lovers of good writing everywhere.
OPERATION ARMADA MISSION BRIEF
June 14, 1940. Naval Intelligence operative Commander Ian Fleming a.k.a. '17F' is parachuted into occupied France with two million pounds in gold. His mission: to negotiate the purchase of sixty battleships from the renegade head of France's Navy, the mysterious and charismatic World War I legend Admiral Darlan. Fleming is assisted in his quest by the French Resistance led by the beautiful saboteur Denise Astier. Plans go awry and 17F is forced to improvise when German Army Group B, led by the sadistic General Bock, makes a run for Admiral Darlan's ships. Hitler needs France's battle-cruisers and destroyers to mount 'Operation Sealion,' his planned invasion of Great Britain. Ian Fleming has four days to get to Darlan before the French fleet is annihilated by the Royal Navy. With General Bock on his heels, and a traitor close to home, 17F finds himself in a race with the biggest stakes imaginable.
OPERATION PARSIFAL MISSION BRIEF
It's January 1944 and in the dark world of political assassinations, 17F has become code for ruthless efficiency.
He prevented Admiral Darlan and General Bock from forming a dangerous alliance in Operation Armada. Now he must do the unthinkable: save the life of Adolph Hitler to ensure an Allied victory.
A stunning young German woman holds the key to solving the enigma of Parsifal but she may be a double-agent working for the psychopathic diamond billionaire Wolfgang Krupp.
In his startling debut novel, Ian Fleming scholar and screenwriter of upcoming movie Fleming Damian Stevenson has crafted the ultimate origin story for one of popular culture's most beloved icons.
Everything that inspired the James Bond books is here: the suave and ruthless central character, his demanding boss, a bevy of beautiful femme fatales, formidable villains bent on world domination, their homicidal henchmen, exotic locations, crackling wit and all the cool cars, sleek guns, ingenious gadgets and monstrous hardware one would expect to see lavishly featured in a gonzo story about the author of Casino Royale, Live and Let Die, Moonraker, The Spy Who Loved Me, From Russia With Love, Diamonds Are Forever, Goldfinger, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, You Only Live Twice and The Man With The Golden Gun.
James Bond was born from the ashes of World War 2 and The Ian Fleming Files: Operation Armada is all the more powerful for its attention to historical reality. This is no flight of fancy. The book has been lauded by Bond experts for the way in which it convincingly takes us inside Ian Fleming's mind as he executes the dangerous missions that inspired his best selling books.
Damian Stevenson researched his novel for six years, interviewing hundreds of people connected to Ian Fleming's life and reading everything ever written about him. The result is an instant classic that will appeal to Bond fans and lovers of good writing everywhere.
OPERATION ARMADA MISSION BRIEF
June 14, 1940. Naval Intelligence operative Commander Ian Fleming a.k.a. '17F' is parachuted into occupied France with two million pounds in gold. His mission: to negotiate the purchase of sixty battleships from the renegade head of France's Navy, the mysterious and charismatic World War I legend Admiral Darlan. Fleming is assisted in his quest by the French Resistance led by the beautiful saboteur Denise Astier. Plans go awry and 17F is forced to improvise when German Army Group B, led by the sadistic General Bock, makes a run for Admiral Darlan's ships. Hitler needs France's battle-cruisers and destroyers to mount 'Operation Sealion,' his planned invasion of Great Britain. Ian Fleming has four days to get to Darlan before the French fleet is annihilated by the Royal Navy. With General Bock on his heels, and a traitor close to home, 17F finds himself in a race with the biggest stakes imaginable.
OPERATION PARSIFAL MISSION BRIEF
It's January 1944 and in the dark world of political assassinations, 17F has become code for ruthless efficiency.
He prevented Admiral Darlan and General Bock from forming a dangerous alliance in Operation Armada. Now he must do the unthinkable: save the life of Adolph Hitler to ensure an Allied victory.
A stunning young German woman holds the key to solving the enigma of Parsifal but she may be a double-agent working for the psychopathic diamond billionaire Wolfgang Krupp.
298 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 1, 2013
8 people are currently reading
103 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 30, 2018
I wish I had found this book and read it before I started reading all the James Bond’s books! It really helps to put James in place and I believe this book is the truth of Ian Flemings war adventures making the book an astounding read! My only problem was that being American I didn’t understand a lot of the military weapons, boats they were talking about and sometimes they’re way of doing things but the story is truly astounding!
February 3, 2014
"Superbly Written High Action Spy Thrillers", February 3, 2014
By Nancy of Utah (Northern Utah) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Ian Fleming Files ('Operation Armada' and 'Operation Parsifal') (Kindle Edition)
Author Damian Stevenson is one of my favorite authors. He's an expert in revealing the history of Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond marvelous series of stories. Stevenson reveals this true history of Fleming in the two stories contained in this box set, "The Ian Fleming Files."
The first story, "Operation Armada," goes back to 1940 when Naval Intelligence operative Commander Ian Fleming, code name 17F, is sent into France with a vast amount of money to negotiate the purchase of battleships for the British Navy. This story moves into non-stop action, with the help from beautiful French Resistance rebel Denise Astier. Fleming's witty humor shines from this high action adventure, especially when trying to keep his intelligence tasks secret. As with Agent 007, Fleming performs amazing feats of skiing, shooting, parachuting, plus more. This story is absolutely fabulous and will keep you spellbound. Because of Author Stevenson's devotion to tell the whole story of the man behind James Bond, he will keep these adventures going for decades of new and inspiring adventures.
The second story, "Operation Parsifal" takes place around 1945 in London which is war torn and weary from the bombings and destruction of the Second World War. Ian Fleming is deeply involved in the war as a commander and a personal assistant to Rear Admiral John Godfrey, Director of Naval Intelligence of the Royal Navy. His mission involves Parsifal where an underground society comprised of bankers and big business officials are seeking to bring down Adolph Hitler. Author Stevenson craftily combines facts with exciting, high-action fiction and has proven successful through his intensive research of Ian Fleming's life. I believe the ultimate achievement in Stevenson's writing about Ian Fleming will result in more major motion pictures of the real hero, Agent Ian Fleming.
By Nancy of Utah (Northern Utah) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Ian Fleming Files ('Operation Armada' and 'Operation Parsifal') (Kindle Edition)
Author Damian Stevenson is one of my favorite authors. He's an expert in revealing the history of Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond marvelous series of stories. Stevenson reveals this true history of Fleming in the two stories contained in this box set, "The Ian Fleming Files."
The first story, "Operation Armada," goes back to 1940 when Naval Intelligence operative Commander Ian Fleming, code name 17F, is sent into France with a vast amount of money to negotiate the purchase of battleships for the British Navy. This story moves into non-stop action, with the help from beautiful French Resistance rebel Denise Astier. Fleming's witty humor shines from this high action adventure, especially when trying to keep his intelligence tasks secret. As with Agent 007, Fleming performs amazing feats of skiing, shooting, parachuting, plus more. This story is absolutely fabulous and will keep you spellbound. Because of Author Stevenson's devotion to tell the whole story of the man behind James Bond, he will keep these adventures going for decades of new and inspiring adventures.
The second story, "Operation Parsifal" takes place around 1945 in London which is war torn and weary from the bombings and destruction of the Second World War. Ian Fleming is deeply involved in the war as a commander and a personal assistant to Rear Admiral John Godfrey, Director of Naval Intelligence of the Royal Navy. His mission involves Parsifal where an underground society comprised of bankers and big business officials are seeking to bring down Adolph Hitler. Author Stevenson craftily combines facts with exciting, high-action fiction and has proven successful through his intensive research of Ian Fleming's life. I believe the ultimate achievement in Stevenson's writing about Ian Fleming will result in more major motion pictures of the real hero, Agent Ian Fleming.
April 12, 2015
I have to say that while I quite liked these two books something didn't quite sit right with me while reading them. Many will know that Ian Fleming is the author of the original James Bond books, and that he drew on his own experiences from working with Naval Intelligence during the Second World War in doing so. With these new books focusing on Fleming himself we are pitched back in time, into war torn London. I found much of the descriptions about what people were wearing rather tedious after a while. Similarly with the vehicles and the equipment being used. Fair enough the author has done plenty of research but personally I found much of it unnecessary. For an English secret agent, I did notice a lot of 'Americanisms' being used.
I did get the impression that the author was trying to use Fleming to out Bond, Bond. However, if you ignore the improbables and the unlikelys these were not bad reads. If I come across more in the series I will read them, but I won't go hell for leather trying to seek them out.
I did get the impression that the author was trying to use Fleming to out Bond, Bond. However, if you ignore the improbables and the unlikelys these were not bad reads. If I come across more in the series I will read them, but I won't go hell for leather trying to seek them out.
March 18, 2014
Great
Although it was so unbelievable that he suffered so many injuries yet kept getting up ready for the next battle it was fun and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would
Although it was so unbelievable that he suffered so many injuries yet kept getting up ready for the next battle it was fun and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would
April 8, 2014
Great book and gives a great insight into the second world war as well as the unsung heroes!
Want to Read
November 19, 2014Interest in topic
January 13, 2015
Meh. Disappointing compared to Fleming's works. Too predictable, probably from reading all the Bond books and watching the movies.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews