John Gardner

Novelist (1926-2007). A graduate of Cambridge University who did his postgraduate work at Oxford, he had variously been a stage magician, an officer in the Royal Marines, a theatrical journalist, a lecturer in Shakespearean production and a priest in the Church of England. In the early '60s, when spy-mania was in its heyday, John Gardner wrote a series of highly acclaimed comic novels featuring Boysie Oakes, a cowardly secret agent. He then wrote some serious espionage novels, particularly those featuring Herbie Kruger - an outstanding fictional character of the Cold War. In the early eighties he was invited by Ian Fleming's literary copyright holders to write a series of continuation James Bond novels which proved to be so successful, world wide, that instead of the contracted three books he went on to publish some fourteen titles, plus two from screenplays.

John Gardner Selected Bibliography:

Boysie Oakes series:
The Liquidator (1964)
Understrike (1965)
Amber Nine (1966)
Madrigal (1967)
Founder Member (1969)
The Airline Pirates aka Air Apparent (1970)
Killer for a Song (1976)
Two Boysie Oakes short stories appear in The Assassination File

Herbie Kruger series:

Nostradamus Traitor (1979)
Garden of Weapons (1980)
Quiet Dogs (1982)
Maestro (1993)
Confessor (1995)

James Bond series:

Licence Renewed (1981)
For Special Services (1982)
Icebreaker (1983)
Role of Honour (1984)
Nobody Lives Forever (1986)
No Deals, Mr. Bond (1987)
Scorpius (1988)
Win, Lose or Die (1989)
Licence to Kill (1989) [film novelization]
Brokenclaw (1990)
The Man from Barbarossa (1991)
Death Is Forever (1992)
Never Send Flowers (1993)
SeaFire (1994)
GoldenEye (1995) [film novelization]
COLD (1996)