`This is a brilliant look at the British Empire, and its fall, as reflected in the gadget-filled, babe-bagging, martini-swilling, world-saving career of James Bond. It's utterly unique. Sly, funny, occasionally sad, a wild mix of cultural history, film criticism, and memoir in which the author, trying to fathom the disorienting collapse of his parents' world, finds the key in the somewhat daft (Winder's word) creation of Ian Fleming. It burns from beginning to end' Rich Cohen, author of Sweet and Low

`Winder pulls it off with fizzing enjoyment . . . His talent for pitch-perfect depreciative comedy fully justifies this aim. When he's not Swift, he's Twain' Sunday Telegraph

`A book of eccentric brilliance that covers everything from Jamaica as lieu de memoire to the sexual magnetism of General Nasser' Times Literary Supplement

`A hilarious blend of cultural history, biography and memoir' Guardian

`An entertaining yomp through the literary and cinematic heartland of James Bond country' Sunday Times

`A diverting book of true fanaticism' Metro

`Almost ridiculously enjoyable' New Statesman

Simon Winder gives us a rollicking tour through Bondland, [and] expertly captures the knowing blend of nostalgia, sophistication, and plain absurdity that made the Bond books (and later the movies) such a hit in the 1950s and '60s. . . . Entertaining and very funny. --Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
Happily, this brilliantly obsessive exegesis on the meaning and influence of the 007 character--part sociological study, part geek memoir--also has a sense of humor about its subject. . . . Indeed, Bond hasn't provided this much entertainment in decades. -- Entertainment Weekly (grade: A)
Sly, funny, occasionally sad, a wild mix of cultural history, film criticism, and memoir. --Rich Cohen, author of Sweet and Low

The nimble and witty Simon Winder sifts through Ian Fleming's formulaic 007 books with excellent and often hilarious explanations. . . . [An] enchanting book--social history at its best. -- The Palm Beach Post

Winder has an easy journalistic tone, a surprisingly objective take on his own obsession, and an encyclopedic knowledge of all things Bond- and Ian Fleming-related. . . . Witty and intelligent. -- Financial Times (U.K.)

Almost ridiculously enjoyable. -- New Statesman (U.K.)

Simon Winder is the author of the highly praised The Man Who Saved Britain and the Sunday Times top-ten bestseller Germania. He works in publishing and lives in Wandsworth Town.