Raymond Benson | James Bond Novelist

September 18, 2009

Interview with Raymond Benson [14:46m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

From Wikipedia:

In 1996, John Gardner resigned from writing Bond books. Glidrose Publications promptly chose Benson to replace him. As a James Bond novelist, Raymond Benson was initially controversial for being American, and for ignoring much of the continuity established by Gardner. Benson had previously written The James Bond Bedside Companion, a book dedicated to Ian Fleming, the official novels, and the films. The book was initially released in 1984 and later updated in 1988. It was nominated for an Edgar Award by Mystery Writers of America in the Best Biographical/Critical Work category. Benson also contributed to the creation of a module in the popular James Bond 007 role-playing game in the 1980s. In total, Benson wrote six James Bond novels, three novelizations, and three short stories. He was the first Bond author since Ian Fleming to write short stories, although Benson’s stories are uncollected, unlike Fleming who had two anthology books published.

Since authoring Bond novels, Benson has had a number of books published, including original suspense novels Face Blind (2003), Evil Hours (2004), and Sweetie’s Diamonds (2006) as well as the non-fiction work The Pocket Essential Guide to Jethro Tull (Jethro Tull biography) (2002). In 2004, Benson began writing the first of two books based on the acclaimed video game series, Splinter Cell, although both are credited to the pseudonym, David Michaels. Further titles in the Splinter Cell series have also been credited to David Michaels, but were not authored by Benson. The first book, Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell was published in 2004 followed by Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Operation Barracuda in 2005. In 2008 Benson wrote A Hard Day’s Death about a private investigator who looks into the death of a rock star. The book spawned a series with the second novel due out in 2009 called Dark Side of the Morgue. Benson also wrote the novelization to the video game Metal Gear Solid in 2008^[1] and will follow that up in 2009 with a novelization of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. Raymond Benson continues to write a series of classic film reviews for the publication “Cinema Retro“.