Exclusive: MI6 reveals the James Bond books fans can look forward to reading in 2012 as the film series celebrates its 50th anniversary...

2012 Books Preview

12th July 2011

As the James Bond movie series celebrates its 50th anniversary next year, there will be a number of books released to reflect on the half-century of EON Production's run of 23 official films (by October 2012). Alongside the silver screen incarnation, there may also be interesting developments ahead with the literary estate.

First off, the official movie book publisher Dorling Kindersley will be churning out a trio of titles to satisfy the casual fan. 'The Bond Chronicle' will be a film-by-film history of the series and will also include Bond 23 as it is scheduled for the shelves in November 2012. Just in time for Christmas, too. 'Fifty Years of Bond Film Posters' will celebrate the marketing of the movies and will hopefully be an improvement on the uninspired 'James Bond Movie Posters' by Tony Nourmand released back in 2002. Rounding out DK's releases for 2012 will be 'Bond on Set', a photography-centric account of the making of Bond 23.

No doubt more exciting for dedicated Bond fans will be the release of an enormous luxury coffee-table book designed by Taschen, who are best known for the books on art, architecture, design and philosophy. The large-format landscape book 'XL James Bond' will run for an amazing 500 pages. Editor Paul Duncan has scoured half-a-million images and 100 filing cabinets of production information to gather the most interesting previously unpublished material from the 007 movies. 'XL James Bond' will be released in November 2012.

Back in the literary James Bond world, the previously announced John Gardner reprints will see paperback releases in the UK beginning on February 4th with 'Licence Renewed', running through to 'Win, Lose or Die' in November. The remainder will be released in 2013. Over in the USA, the paperback series starts in October 2012. A trade paperback edition of the new continuation novel 'Carte Blanche' by Jeffery Deaver is expected on 17th April 2012.

But it may not be as smooth sailing for the Ian Fleming catalogue next year. The existing print licence with Penguin for the Ian Fleming novels will expire in 2012, and if an extension is not agreed, or the rights switch to another publisher, it may mean no new reprints as the world succumbs to Bond Fever later next year. The sticking point is digital rights, which are not included in the current agreement, and has allowed Ian Fleming Publications to issue e-books independently. It is unlikely that any publisher would take the Bond contract without the (now) extremely lucrative electronic rights. According to reports last year, the Bond licence is worth £3m a year to IFP, but the backlist only sells approximately 100,000 paper copies a year in the UK and USA combined, making it an expensive prospect for any publisher.