New Guy Faulks' Plot

Double-O Heaven, It's Another Bond Author

You can never, ever write him off. James Bond's creator, Ian Fleming, died more than 40 years ago, but the British secret agent is being ``adopted'' by a new author. When Fleming's estate announced that they had someone in mind, John le Carre and Frederick Forsyth were touted as likely contenders. But Sebastian Faulks has trumped them all. `Devil May Care', the fifteenth Bond adventure, will be published by Penguin next May to mark the centenary of original writer Ian Fleming's birth. It will be set in the Cold War with the action played out across two continents.

Trivia Pur$uit

Author Ian Fleming, who created the fictional spy James Bond, revealed in the early 1960s that he ``borrowed'' the name of a real-life ornithologist who wrote a book about the birds of the West Indies. Fleming later explained, "It struck me that this name, brief, unromantic and yet very masculine, was just what I needed."