Amazon buys rights to Bond books
A vintage cover for ‘Casino Royale’ by Ian FlemingLOS ANGELES, April 19 — Ian Fleming’s series of bestselling books about James Bond, aka 007, the sleek British spy, portrayed in films by actors from Sean Connery to Craig Daniels, have been acquired by the mega book retailer Amazon, it was announced on April 17.
Scooping up the North American rights, the relatively new publishing branch of Seattle-based Amazon.com has bought the republication rights for 10 years, for both the print books — and ebooks, of course.
Although 100 million copies of the suspense novel series have sold worldwide since their publication.
Fourteen classic Bond books fall within the agreement, ranging from the 1950s to the 1960s, including the following:
“Casino Royale”, “Live and Let Die”, “Moonraker”, “Diamonds Are Forever”, “From Russia with Love”, “Dr. No”, “Goldfinger”, “For Your Eyes Only”, “Thunderball”, “The Spy Who Loved Me”, “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”, “You Only Live Twice”, “The Man With The Golden Gun”, and “Octopussy and the Living Daylights”.
The films made from most of those titles have kept the James Bond tradition alive for new generations.
Since Fleming’s death in 1964, his estate hired authors John Gardner and Kingsley Amis (as Robert Markham) to write books to keep the franchise going. But these titles are not in the agreement with Amazons’ licensing deal.
Amazon will initially make the James Bond ebooks available exclusively on Amazon’s Kindle store.
When released this summer, the new paperback editions of the books will be available through Amazon’s online retail store with new cover art. According to The Wall Street Journal, some competing retailers such as Barnes & Noble have stated that they would no longer carry books published by the Amazon imprint. — AFP-Relaxnews
