 The two previous Fleming novels from Russia with Love and Dr. No were both incredibly fun to read. You can hear exactly why I praised them in my respective episodes covering those. So I pretty much started reading the next in line a day after finishing Dr. No. I remember finding Goldfinger a mediocre Fleming novel last time I read it. Is it still the case revisiting it recently? Let's find out. Goldfinger the book is divided into three sections and to quote Goldfinger himself. Mr. Bond, they have a saying in Chicago. Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, the third time it's enemy action. At the start of the book Bond finds himself exhausted and contemplating life in between flights on Miami airport having just come off the killing of a Mexican criminal. The killing really took a toll on him and he's looking for a slice of life. This is when he runs into Mr. Dupond, a reoccurring character who happened to have been seated next to Bond during the Casino Royale novel when Bond was facing the chief at the cards table. Great continuity once again. He asks Bond for a favor. He has been playing a certain Mr. Oric Goldfinger, playing cards, but he suspects he's cheating. He asks Bond to help expose his cheating in exchange for a little bit of rich life in the best hotel in town. This is when we get the happenstance. Goldfinger is a mysterious rich man who claims he's deaf and has agoraphobia. Therefore he cannot stand the big open space and instead needs to face the hotel at all times. Bond of course soon finds out he's full of shit and he is indeed cheating with the help of a beautiful blonde woman using a radio and binoculars from the hotel. Bond exposes his cheating, runs off with the girl and doesn't think much of this. When he returns to London he finds out MI6 happens to also be on to Goldfinger, suspecting him for smuggling gold. And M wouldn't be surprised if Goldfinger turned out to actually be the treasurer for Smurse. So Bond is sent out to find out more about him. So his mission takes him from a golf match to be tied down facing a saw and eventually uncovering Goldfinger's master plan, Operation Grand Slam. Being imprisoned by Goldfinger, Bond is the only one with knowledge of this plan that involves the killing of thousands of people and only Bond can stop it. So as mentioned before, Bond is contemplating life in sort of a depressed state at the start of this novel and to me it's interesting to see this human side of Bond again. Killing has repercussions on him and it's understandable he takes Mr Dupont's offer when his flight is cancelled. The exposing of Goldfinger cheating at cards is essentially a rehash of Bond exposing Drax at the start of the Moonraker novel, which also had a rich millionaire cheating at cards just for the sake of it. Drax and Goldfinger are kind of similar in that way when I think about it. So in a way it feels like a little bit of been there done that reading these in order. Just like Moonraker, this book is also divided into three sections. But the redeeming aspect, just like Moonraker, is that it's a lot of fun to read. Of course, Bond doesn't drive a DB5 in this because, well, that wasn't on the market yet. Instead, Bond gets to choose a car that fits his cover of a rich man between the Jaguar 3.4 or the Aston Martin DB3. Naturally, he chooses the latter. Despite what you might think, the gadget-ladenness only came to existence in its cinematic counterpart, right? Well, the car actually has the ability to change front and rear lights in color, which, when you think about it, is extremely convenient when being chased or following someone at night. I like that Bond kind of resembles what his cinematic counterpart would become in the way he's constantly poking the beast's nest in this. He has some very amusing lines to get under Goldfinger's skin. How's the agoraphobia? Doesn't all this wide-open space bother it? No. I can tell you that if Oddjob had used the appropriate single blow on any one of seven points on your body, you would now be dead. Goldfinger bit at the side of the drumstick with relish. Bond said seriously, that's interesting. I only know five ways of killing Oddjob with one blow. Of course, Goldfinger cheats his way through the golfing in the same way he cheats his way through the carts, and Bond once again exposes him. And these golfing passages also holds what's probably is one of my favorite Fleming quotes of all time, that he gives to Bond. The difference between a good golf shot and a bad one is the same as the difference between a beautiful and a plain woman, a matter of millimeters. What a connoisseur. I love that. I usually don't picture any of the actors when reading through the Bond novels, but for the first time I'm having trouble picturing anyone else but Gert Frobe as Ari Goldfinger. The movie just nailed that casting and solidified the look I associate with Ari Goldfinger, and he's very similar to the book too. There is a whole passage that wasn't in the movie when Bond gets to snoop around Goldfinger's estate in England, only to find out a camera has been watching him the whole time. So he uses Goldfinger's cat and frames him for ruining the camera film, for which Goldfinger has his cat be served to eat for Oddjob. I mean, what the hell? There is this twisted side to Goldfinger that is not really seen in the movie. I also lost count at how many times Fleming mentioned Goldfinger looked at Bond with an x-ray glance staring straight through the back of his skull. But it happened so many times. He's kind of creepy in a non-menacing way. Oddjob is definitely menacing and scary, in a way similar to his movie's counterpart but also being extremely skilled at karate. And yes, his bowler hat weapon does in fact feature in the original novel. The novel includes not one, but three Bond girls. Jill Masterton appears at the start of the book, mostly as a beautiful woman. Bond does actually spend a weekend on a train with her, as one of the conditions he asks for Goldfinger after exposing his cheating. Much like the movies, he is eventually killed for that and is painted fully Gold first. Sadly, we're only told about him doing so in Flashback, unlike the movie. Bond doesn't get to see this with his own eyes. Her sister Tilly Masterton actually appears much longer than her movie counterpart does and is kind of a closet lesbian, and she later turns out to be quite attracted to Pussy Galore. Tilly in the novel is not killed at Goldfinger's factory, but instead is taken hostage to Gettengwit Bond to work for Goldfinger. Both of them are assigned to do the paperwork for Goldfinger's operation Grand Slam, which I thought was really bizarre. Why would Goldfinger not just kill them? He could literally pay anyone to do this paperwork job. The operation Grand Slam does involve Ford Knox, just like the movie, but here, the objective is to rob Ford Knox with the help of several gangsters, including the Union Sicilione and the Spangled Mob returning from Diamond's Offer Ever. Pussy Galore is the head of a female gangster group in New York in this and is another lesbian character. She doesn't really feature that much. I think her concept is great, but she isn't really in this long enough. Operation Grand Slam itself does sound very ambitious and larger than life and starts off promising at the start, but isn't as cool as its cinematic portrayal. We don't even get to go inside of Ford Knox, as Bond uses a message in a bottle to be delivered to Felix Leiter to rescue the situation. Unlike the movie, Tilly finds her death at the hand of Arjab's hat here at Ford Knox instead. The climax of the book is a lot better than I remembered though. Bond is told he needs to take a routine vaccine at the airport, but that puts him to sleep and has him on board of a hijack playing by Goldfinger. This is where Bond, in a desperate attempt, destroys a window pressurizing the cabin with Arjab flying out of the window. I forgot about that, and Goldfinger and Bond end up strangling each other with Bond choking him to death. The sequence of Bond radioing the ground support from the hijack playing left me with a huge smile. A new voice, a voice of authority, perhaps the captains came over the air. I love that bit and I wish they did something similar in the movie. At the end of the book, Bond ends up with Pussy Galore, and though by today's standards, it's probably frowned upon, but Bond ending up charming the lesbian Pussy Galore at the end just adds to the whole fantasy element of, only Bond could do that. And again, say what you want, but as a Bond fan, that ending just left me with a huge smile. It came closer to that feeling of watching the cinematic Bond and you can't help but feel like, my man. I know Anthony Horowitz wrote a sequel to this book as one of the continuation novels in Trigger Mortis that has Pussy Galore reappear. I'm curious to see what happens there, but I'm going through these books in chronological release order so it might take a few years before I finally reach that one. So here's what's interesting. I think Dr. Noda movie and novel were both equally entertaining and the novel from Russia with Love was even better than the great film. Here I feel the cinematic counterpart is far superior to this novel. Guy Hamilton truly perfected the cinematic blueprint with the film and everything about it just became so iconic and only approved upon almost everything from the book. Bond does get to see the golden Jill Masterson killed by Goldfinger. The pacing is better. Instead of the saw we get the updated laser and the filmmakers were probably correct to kill Tilly Masterson earlier so that they could develop Pussy Galore as the main Bond girl a bit more. The film version of her character is vastly different though. Being a pilot is only implied to be a lesbian. She does still have a female group that she is the leader of, but there are no criminals in the movie. Also of course the big improvement is that the movie acknowledges that rating Fort Knox would be impossible logistically so they updated it to making the place radioactive for years so Goldfinger's Gold raises in value. It's an ingenious move and it allowed for Ken Adam to create the brilliant Fort Knox interior movie set, something that was definitely missing for the book. Also as a side note Bond uses a device exactly like the Identacraft to describe Goldfinger at MI6 in this book which likely inspired the one they used in For Your Eyes Only. Anyway I guess only the plain climax is better in the book and I like the visit to Goldfinger's Mansion that wasn't in the movie but other than that while the book is a fun read the film is a masterpiece. So Goldfinger the book may not be as good as its cinematic counterpart but is it still worth your time? I think so. I finished reading it in a few days despite it being the biggest Fleming novel because it was entertaining. Fleming did end up recycling some ideas like the card game cheating exposing at the start and then doing something very similar again at the gold passages. Also having a public millionaire who turns out to have a dastardly plan was of course kind of Moonraker's plot too but the books are different enough and there's just a lot to enjoy in it. For one I really enjoyed Bond in this. He's funnier and gets more of that fantasy element his cinematic counterpart has in this book. Goldfinger and Oddjob are also great villains. All female characters were not really that fleshed out in this but to me they do their job and they work within the context of the book. I would say I enjoyed this more than I remembered it and especially that climax pleasantly surprised me again. So overall a step down from the previous two but still another solid read.