Summary- Vivienne Michel is a girl who has had some bad relationships in her life. Her first love, Derek, had pressure her into sleeping with him at a public cinema. When they get caught by the manager, Derek takes her into the woods to finish the deed. The act devastates her, and she leaves to work for a local newspaper, where she does an excellent job and is befriended by the editor. Eventually, her editor, and German named Kurt, eventually sleeps with her too, after a long period of friendship. However, when she ends up pregnant he gives her money for an abortion and fires her. She has the abortion, and buys a motor scooter, with the plans to leave Canada and drive all the way South through America. She arrives at a small inn in New York, and is hired as help and left to close up by herself on the last night. Later that night, two men show up, who claim to be workers of the owner of the inn. She lets them in, but then they start to treat her roughly. She tries to escape, only to be caught. Just as the man called Horror is about to rape her, James Bond shows up, by chance. He had a flat tire and has to stop for the night. The two men play it cool, but Vivienne gets the idea across to Bond that these two men are not very nice. Bond helps protect Vivienne, and foils the men's plot to burn the inn down with Vivienne inside it, making it look like she caused the fire. They could then claim the insurance money. Bond has to kill them both Vivienne will always remember Bond as the first good man in her life. My Grade- B+ This is one of the most unique novels Fleming wrote. He has a preface at the beginning that this whole story was found on his desk, written by Vivienne Michel, and that he is just publishing it. It is written in first person. (Fleming can write eerily convincingly as a twenty year old woman.) Bond only shows up at the end to save the day. The plot also has plenty of action, despite it not involving a huge-scale mission of Bond's. Best Moment-The best moment is when Bond shows up, just at the exact moment. The reader knows that Bond will show up and save the day, but it's still cool when he shows up out of the blue and immediately begins taking control of the situation.
