From the Raven to the Dove

    Recently I read a good book. 

   I know I know, you're saying ANOTHER DAMN BOOK REVIEW?! DON'T YOU KNOW WE HATE THESE AND WANT YOU TO WRITE FUNNY SHIT TO MAKE US GIGGLE?!

   Yeah yeah, I'll write jokes later, I'll smash a damn watermelon, put a prop arrow in my head, whatever you want. For the time being, though, I need to talk about something...

   Or rather someone.

   About 36 years ago, I was channel surfing when upon me came a show on USA that I'd seen once or twice before in daytime called The Edge of Night. I hadn't caught the plot or characters before that, I just liked the music theme. Come to early 1986, I finally sit to catch the actual show. It was an array of some really interesting, off-the-wall characters, from psychotic killers to fraudulent actors to obsessed cops...and at the center of a lot of these stories and dialogues was what could be described as an anti-heroine, someone who people rooted for but wasn't necessarily good. 

   Her name was Raven Whitney...actually I would later come to learn she was Raven Alexander Jamison Swift Whitney. She was played by a quite gorgeous woman named Sharon Gabet. I must admit, at 13 I was quite smitten with her just as much as any girl I liked in junior high.

   When the Edge run ended on USA in early 1989, I was quite bummed, though I knew she was on another soap at that point, just not a front-of-the-line role. For the next ten years, all I had was the scant videotapes of whatever I'd recorded. Then in 1999, I found an Edge web page from which I found some people who had more than I had on tape! I bought a few tapes and that kept me going for some time. Then AOL video aired episodes earlier than the USA run and I got an earlier and quite nastier Raven!

   Even later I found a group on Facebook devoted to Edge as well as another person who sold episodes on disc! Admittedly I spent over $300 on these but this show was important to me and I got to relive what I saw decades before, plus stuff I hadn't seen because I caught it months after the run began. Most importantly, in the group was none other than Sharon Gabet herself! She shared much with us about the show, as well as the fact that she had written a book called From the Raven to the Dove (yeah I know, talk about your long preliminaries, Bryan!). It was more about her spiritual and emotional journey as an adult than about her days as a soap star. She was also good enough to answer questions from me in IM personally. You have no idea what that meant to me after all those years.

   It took me a while, but I finally decided I wanted to get this book and read what Sharon had to say, so I asked for it for Christmas. Thankfully my sister-in-law got a copy for me. When I opened the present, I was beyond ecstatic!

   Truly, I felt a surge of energy holding this book before I opened it up. It was like I held a certain expectation of what I would read, even though I truly knew Sharon is just a human being like the rest of us. Then I flipped past the opening title page and what not and got to the actual text.

   What I received through reading this book over the course of a few weeks was an incredible journey, a tale of someone who grew up in a seemingly idyllic 1950s environment. I must admit that as a child of the 70s and early 80s, I shared some of the same memories...mostly the outdoor life, exploration, options of places to go in a time before the virtual world consumed us. Millenials would not likely understand this life, it is so foreign.

    Yet, that was just the opening.

    The ensuing chapters are about her growth and experience as a model, then a nurse in New York City...and a nasty perspective of an abortion clinic in New York City in the mid 1970s...not a pretty scene. 

    Then there is the acting part of her life that would go for over a decade of thrills, excitement, and a sad number of downs that came toward the end. How Sharon describes it is more than what some might consider a midlife crisis, but more about a person looking around herself and wondering suddenly who she is. She is frustrated, angry, and in despair...almost like the acting had gone on for much longer than her years on TV.

    What really got to me in the "meat" of the book was how she saw herself in terms of her relationships with men...as well as with her children. What she was looking for, or what she thought she needed to look for, tended not to pan out in the long run. Anyone can see someone going through a divorce, maybe two divorces,  and say, "Well, they didn't try hard enough to make it work." Sharon goes to great depths to show that we do not always know what our souls truly need or want. Society has a great, almost EVIL, role in telling us what we should do in our relationships, what roles we are destined to play...especially for females. Yet the same goes for men, the sense of tough dominance and authority they need to exhibit in order to fit the role, to be accepted. 

   I have to confess that my vocabulary in terms of spiritual journeys, so-called "mythical" creatures and ideas are many times lost on me as I read Sharon's words...the words "skip a bit, brother" from Monty Python and the Holy Grail hit my brain a few times when it got too deep vocabulary-wise. Yet, those were small parts that just enhanced Sharon's overall message which was always understood at the end of each chapter.

   And then when she talks about her children, I can see the love, the deep connection...and the frustrations that accompany. Sharon has a daughter who is autistic, and her journey from discovering that quality to exploring ways to cope and communicate with her, show that Sharon Rose Gabet is not your average suburban single mom who merely gets her child diagnosed and fights with the school over the IEP for years...no she went BEYOND that and found people and experience to help make connections. There is a part near the end when her daughter says "NO" and means it...I won't tell the story of that, but it showed that those people and experiences had borne fruit.

   Possibly one of the deepest themes (maybe THE DEEPEST)Sharon explores, maybe deeper than relationship dynamics and expectations, is the relationship with God that she has explored...often referring to God as Creator, an accurate name and perhaps more appropriate as a descriptor. It is a deep topic explored throughout the book, from her Catholic upbringing to examining the social norms and expectations of believing and what believing truly means when one digs deep into their soul about their true relationship with "the man upstairs". I related to this theme as I have taken a smaller mental journey of my relationship with God and have come to understand what I see it to be...and have felt it to me more rewarding inside.

   Toward the end, Sharon shares her online and phone reunion and some times with her Edge love Larkin Malloy. We as fans were devastated when he left us over 5 years ago, but her take was especially emotional given their past time together. You can feel the love between them onscreen even though they never got together in real life. One understands that sometimes things are meant...and not meant to be. Our inner energy does not always match with others the way we WANT them to. Yet what they had in their way was more real than probably most marriages I have seen onscreen and real life.

   All I can really say to end this review is that it all started with being a fan...and I still am. I can watch the adventures of Raven and Sky on The Edge of Night over and over on disc and Youtube and never get tired of it. Yet, by the end of the book, I feel empowered to dig even more deeply into myself to unravel a few knots and see where I end up. It could be scary, it could be exhilarating...possibly both simultaneously. 

   Thank you, Sharon, for giving me probably one of the most meaningful reads I have ever experienced.

Egg Bites

2021...A Mild Hell in Review

 It's the New Year, everyone! It may be raining or snowing or sunny where you are today, but no matter where you are, we're past the fireworks moment. That moment was not really about it being 2022 so much as kicking 2021 to the curb permanently...for many of us!

If any of you had a positive and blessed 2021, that is wonderful, and I wish you the same happiness this year.

For many others, however, it was not a positive and blessed year. Many had personal or health (or both!) problems. COVID pretty much ruled the year with vaccination side effects or not knowing what to do about getting the vaccination or its booster, and the damn masks!

And then there was the political turmoil. The events of January 6, 2021, are still fresh in the minds of many, and like the vaccination controversy there are varied opinions on what actually happened. This is the first year in my life that an ex President remained in the public eye and attention after he left...because he wanted it that way.

As for me and my family, we hung in there as always. Vickie had a hysterectomy and I was lucky (har har)enough to get 2 kidney stones blasted. Vickie got us a deal online for 2 bikes, and in the late Spring and most of the summer I rode all over the northernmmost neighborhoods where some orchards and many horses resided...almost a rural Pennsylvania feeling, except the high humidity was missing.

Working summer school provided funds for some short getaways in late June and all of July, the highlight being Cedar City, Utah for me.

Thankfully we teachers were able to start and STAY in our classrooms with our kids, little to no virtual quarantine emergencies.

Celebrities we lost (ones I am familiar with anyway): Peter Scolari, Willie Garson, Norm MacDonald, Charlie Watts, Jackie Mason, Charlie Robinson, William Smith (I didn't know this one till today!), director Richard Donner, soap performers Ray MacDonnell and Stuart Damon, Clarence Williams III, Arlene Golonka, Gavin MacLeod, B.J. Thomas, Robert Hogan, Charles Grodin, Tawny Kitaen, Olympia Dukakis, Frank McRae, Johnny Crawford, Jessica Walter, George Segal, Rush Limbaugh, Larry Flynt, Christopher Plummer, Dustin Diamond, Cicely Tyson, Cloris Leachman, Hal Holbrook, Larry King, Hank Aaron, Phil Spector, Joanne Rogers, John Reilly, Marion Ramsey, Tanya Roberts, Gregory Sierra, and, just yesterday, Betty White....proving 2021 had one more groin kick for us all.

Celebrity deaths aside, many of us suffered the loss of a friend or family member, which makes the loss much more heartfelt. My mom lost her friend Rose, whom she had met at the National University library in San Diego almost 29 years ago. She was a very sweet woman, I remember her fondly. She passed at age 73. We also lost our elderly former downstairs neighbor Norma in June. Even after we moved into the house, we continued to come help her with her cable remote or pick things up (like smokes) from the store. A very kind woman who had known Natalie since she was 2. Norma passed at 89.

This may sound trite, but let us take the tragedies and bad news of 2021 and do what we can to make 2022 the best we can make it. My advice...make reasonable goals you can attain and maintain, not crazy half-hearted "resolutions"...New Year's resolutions at heart are a meaningless tradition passed on from other generations who usually failed at resolutions as well...and as we are a nation often fails to learn from past failures, let's break this bad habit once and for all!

A happy blessed and successful 2022 to all!

The Christmas Letter

 Dear Everyone,

   Well,  here we are again after a year. Wow, where has the time gone? Lots has happened in this short time, and I don't quite know where to start, not to mention how to fit it into a concise letter that most of you will probably stop reading after the first paragraph or so. However, since I have this neurotic need to boast about my family's successes in the hopes of one-upping at least one of you other shit-braggarts at least once, let's let it rip!

   Our oldest finally came off of alcohol...again...this past autumn. Of course, he didn't have much of a choice after landing in jail for D and D (NOT  Dungeons and Dragons) for the eighth time this year. It should be noted that he was very polite to the officer when he showed him his...pride. In our son's defense, officers of the law should be more clear when asking for an ID from someone under the influence. In his state, our son thought ID meant immense..."definition". Having landed in the clink a few times myself for inebriation in the past, I can relate to him. Having been arrested so often got him in a slightly higher class of imprisonment, so he is moving up in the world. Even better, he is now the official "Queen" of C block, so now he finally has a title at 26 years old.

   Then there is our younger child. Now, I have heard all of you chortling behind her back about dressing like a hoe and being the most likely to get knocked up before turning 20. Well the joke's on you all! She's only 17 and has 3 months to go before the due date! The dad is a fine gentleman. His official title is "social director" and has an office, so to speak, close to all the local motels. He even gets a commission from all the nearby businesses for bringing them business himself! Hopefully our grandchild will carry on his family name!

   Of course, there is my wife! God bless her, she really has an interest in building our credit rating and local exposure. We went from having very little debt to well over $10,000 in credit cards alone. I was worried about her for a bit with our son's and daughter's successes and feeling somewhat left out. No sir! She has amassed an impressive new wardrobe, made local business connections at various hostels and bars, not to mention making contributions to our local police and court systems. She even unofficially modeled for a local lingerie outfit and has created a demand for more. For some reason, the cash flow has gone away rather than toward us, but I am sure she knows what she's doing.

    And then there's boring old me with the same old sales job traveling all over the place, eating and drinking alone often. Thankfully I am not always forced to sleep alone! I've often woken up as the guest of some kind stranger or another...who for some reason are often rushing me out, but hey, everyone has to get to their own job, right? After one of those trips, I did have a persistent itch and oddly colored mark that hasn't gone away. After all those pleas to get a COVID shot, I am wondering if that'll clear it up?

   Well, that's been our wonderful year! I cannot imagine being in a more loving, successful, and growing family. Hope you all have a great New Year. Try not to be jealous of us, we just do things our way!

Love, 

Phil

That does not compute!

    As I sit here typing what drivel has to come out of my head from time to time, I cannot help but marvel at the splendid progression of technology...and how I am always about 10 steps behind that progression! Seriously, even though my wife has supplied me at various times with color-changing speakers and color-enhanced keyboards, my machine is state of the art...for 1999 almost!

    Well ok, that is quite an exaggeration. The thing is, 1999 seems so yesterday to me, like I was still 27! That's how time flies. One day I'm a swinging ( as in by a thread) bachelor and the next day I'm a husband of 15 years and father of 12 years. Somewhere in this time warp I was using this damn computer to run a virtual classroom for a bit over 2 months of physical classroom exile. Still, I am fairly attached to my computer...for I built it. I have actually build a few incarnations of a personal computer over the past 13 years.

    Oh hell no, Moore! You didn't....you wouldn't! Oh shit you did....you tricked us via text hypnosis into following you down another f'n memory lane traffic jam! (sigh). Fine, let's get this over with!

    The first computer we had actually belonged to me. On Christmas of 1985, my father had apparently seen "A Christmas Story" for the first time and decided to enhance the Darren McGavin's "Hey, what's that over there?" ruse.  After putting me on a seemingly endless wild goose chase via "Look over here" notes, I was finally awarded a complete Commodore 64 hardware suite consisting of the keyboard/CPU unit, floppy disk drive, monitor, and dot matrix printer. All of those components except 1 were pretty good...except for the printer. Apparently Commodore had a jump start on the jamming tradition that has caused so much office and school alcohol consumption spikes. I believe we ended up getting a compatible yet non Commodore printer later as I did use my computer for school work as well when needed.

    My dad's office had a whole library of Commodore games and I got loaded up pretty fast on disk copies. Of course, this was long before the age of point and click ease of use with a mouse. One had to type such pesky commands as 

LOAD "NERDGAMES",8,1

and hope that the disk was of decent quality. Most of the time it was. My old Atari joystick could be lugged into the machine to play arcade-style games, so that was a lot of fun for a while. About a year later, I got a 300 "baud" modem. I believe baud was a Euro-originated word for slow as Granny's molasses, for when I called into online BBS's (bulletin board services) that had game downloads, the download speed was abysmal! I later got a higher speed one, but after a couple of years I had gotten past those as a fun pastime.

    One other thing the computer got me good at was typing. I actually taught myself to type as I created stories, many early ones influenced by my favorite show at the time, "The Edge of Night".

    I actually held on to the Commodore for several years, finally retiring it in late 1992. I don't remember if it just died or what, but my dad had already brought an older PC from work. It was monochrome to be sure, but I did some papers for school on it as well as writing more stories. I held on to that one for a long time, I believe it was retired in the early 21st century. Most of the time in the late 90s, though, I tended to use my friend/roommate Scott's iMac more than my own.

    My dad gave me another used office model when I moved to Las Vegas. It was ok, but those pesky work numbers always wanted a special password. I had enough of that so I went to CompUSA and a computer of my own...CPU, monitor, printer, and the works. Combined with my Earthlink dialup credentials, I was Internet bound on my own at last, doing lesson plans and looking for women! I was successful in the former, hit and miss on the latter.

    One thing I was not ready for with a Windows PC was the number of shady websites that had viruses and eventually the computer didn't even turn on despite the various virus scanners and "protections" I had put on. A new hard drive seemed to resolve this, and I learned to be more cautious in the sites I was navigating.

    Then came the Lesley masters program that I began in early 2008. Of the many tech related subjects I studied, the anatomy of a computer course that I took was my favorite. As a final project, I opted to build my own computer from a "barebones" kit I bought from TigerDirect for about $200. For that price I got a case, hard drive, and associated wires. All I needed was an optical (CD-rom) drive on my own. From then on I was occasionally buying a new hard drive or operating system. A few years ago, I upgraded almost entirely with a new case. That said, I think the novelty of building my own has worn off. Its just too tough to keep up with what works anymore. Granted a new computer can be expensive, so this old thing will have to do for now, provided we aren't tossed back home again..

    All right, flashbacks are now over, you may resume crash position!

The Divorcé Part 5

    The door opened. Dr. Friedman waved me in with a smile. "Sam, right on time as always." He closed the door behind me and waved at the proverbial shrink couch. "Take your favorite seat."

   I sat in the big soft lumpy sofa and relaxed. I'd been seeing Friedman since a bit before the divorce, when I knew things were coming at me. 

   Friedman checked his notes as he sat in his swivel chair, then looked up. "Last time we spoke, you were getting back into the dating world."

   "I've been wading in, testing the waters so to speak."

  "And how does the water feel?"

  "Good at times...other times cold."

  "Might depend on which end of the pool you're in."

  "Brad, I'm not even going tot try to analyze that."

   Friedman laughed. "Well, the shallow end tends to warm faster as its the safer end...on the other hand, the deep end has more variety but can take longer to navigate." He stopped. "Forget it...I'm no good at ad lib analogies." He checked his notes again. "There's a topic you and I didn't grab tightly on , and this is 2 sessions ago. You were so excited about your dating that we didn't touch on it again at all."

  "Which is?"

  "The woman at work. Natasha was her name, right?"

  "Oh yeah, we're going way back!"

  "You brought me there, I never left." Friedman sat forward. "You indicated that you'd fallen for her."

   I sat back and looked up at the ceiling, the memory coming back. "Yeah, this is 6 years ago."

  "Tell me about her."

  "I didn't tell you last time?"

  "You told me her name and that you were in love with her, but that's as far as we got. No, wait, you told me she was also married, right?"

  "Right. You know I'm thinking on that time and realizing something right off the bat...I was more in love with the idea of her than actually being in love with her."

  "All right. What idea of her was so appealing?"

  "Now that's a question I've asked myself time and time again...but I don't have a solid clue. SHe was pretty enough. Had the most kissable lips I'd ever seen, that's for sure."

  "Did you ever kiss them?"

  "Oh no, not even a cheek peck. Despite my feelings, I still respected her marriage."

   Friedman sat back and folded his arms. "All right, let's go back to then. What was it about her that got those feelings going?"

  "Hoo boy! Well, when I first started at the office, it took a bit to fit in. You know, new guy and all coming into an established colleague web. Well, at a staff lunch function, I was sitting by myself...this was about 3 months in...and she asks me to come sit with her and some of her friends. I wasn't precisely involved in their conversation, ladies and all, but I wasn't alone. That was the start."

  "Sounds friendly but it doesn't exactly spell out love to me."

  "Not to me, either. Just as time went, we talked more and got to know each other. Before I knew it I was thinking a lot about her. At first I thought it was pure lust. There was some of that, but not overwhelming. No, this was a heart matter. My day was definitely improved when I'd had some contact with her, either in person or even text. Luckily for me, she never really knew my feelings, at least I don't think she did. Then something happened...some crisis in her husband's family and she took a little time off so they could travel."

   Friedman nodded. "Did she come back?"

  "Yeah, but she was a lot more reserved...very inward...after. I tried to offer an ear of support, but she kept it inside, so I backed away. After about a year, no it was two years, she transferred to another office in another town. It was quiet, no going away party or anything, in fact quite sudden."

  "I see. So you developed some friendly, I'll go with FOND, feelings for another woman. Sounds perfectly normal and nothing to feel ashamed of...if you feel ashamed."

  "I don't now, I did a little then, probably because I mentioned Natasha more than a healthy mention at home."

  "And your wife didn't care for that."

  "We had a few fights about it."

  "And when Natasha left, did it get back to normal?"

   I looked at Brad with a frown. "Normal? I did get a divorce not all that long after."

  "Right. So here's a question: do you think your feelings for Natasha were a factor in your divorce?"

   I looked back at the ceiling. "That is hard to say. My marriage was never normal, whatever that word means. Three years passed between Natasha leaving and my wife leaving, so somehow I doubt it was a main factor."

  "But it might have been one."

  "Could be. I doubt it."

   Friedman closed his notebook. "Sam, we've been dancing around this for a while. We never really hit at it, though."

  "Right, the why of it all."

  "Your feelings for Natasha, innocent as they seem to me, are the first clues as to cause. Apart from that, nothing on your end seems to justify any of it. Although, when she left, you didn't seem too anguished over it apart from the change in life."

  "So ok, I developed feelings for another woman, my wife languished over it for 3 years, then decided I wasn't worth fighting to save our marriage, so she split. Simple, right?"

   Friedman laughed. "Nah, this will take some more cracking. Collecting a $20 copay from you weekly was in fact my life's ambition, so we will look more into this next week. Same time?"

  "Same Bat channel!"

Rest In Peace, Mr. Bond

    This weekend my family and I went to see the latest...and quite honestly last, movie of the James Bond Franchise. It was a really touching end and Daniel Craig pulled it off well. 

   Now, when I mean franchise, I mean a single production company's produced series of films. In this case, I mean the James Bond film franchise that has been in existence since the release of Dr. No in 1962. Yes, the James Bond film franchise has been in existence for nearly 60 years.

   When the series began, it starred Sean Connery as Britain's favorite secret agent with the number 007, the license to kill, created by Ian Fleming. The first movie story began simply, with Bond traveling to Jamaica to find out what happened to Professor Strangways. In that movie we meet many of the regulars that were to be included in the series: Bond's superior M, a gruff old naval admiral whom Bond respected and annoyed quite frequently; Miss Moneypenny, M's secretary who carried an innocent flirtation with Bond over the course of many films; Q, the British Secret Service armorer who supplied Bond with many weapons and oddly futuristic gadgets and who was frequently annoyed by Bond's lack of respect for said equipment, particularly cars; and Felix Leiter, Bond's CIA counterpart, who appeared infrequently over the course of the series...seen just once in the Roger Moore era and never in the Pierce Brosnan era.

   From the success of Dr. No, fans of Britain's new superhero were treated to a movie a year from 1962 to 1965, then every other year as a pattern most of the time for a while. After Thunderball, there was a 2-year wait until the release of You Only Live Twice, which set a new precedent for creating an almost entirely new story from the existing book source. The previous 4 movies had probably 80% source material intact if not more. I've written about that movie and book before, and to briefly repeat, I enjoy both about equally, which is a lot.

   After Connery took the reins for 5 films, he was getting tired of playing Bond and quit after You Only Live Twice. The producers found a new face in Aussie George Lazenby for On Her Majesty's Secret Service. This movie is fantastic by my standards even though Lazenby was not Connery, a fact many took a huge disliking to. Yet, if one puts aside the man's lack of acting experience, the movie is great and returns to the book faithfulness. On Her Majesty's Secret Service saw James Bond falling in love with a troubled woman whom he rescues a few times and she later rescues him. She tragically dies from an attempt on Bond's wife from Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the SPECTRE chief who, in my opinion, is probably Bond's greatest foe of all time.

   Sean Connery was coaxed to return for Diamonds Are Forever, a film that really delved into silly antics in its second half. It was once a favorite of mine, but is now viewed just for its Las Vegas scenes.  The next movie, Live and Let Die, introduced the Roger Moore era of Bond...an era that with maybe one or two exceptions, represented the low end of the franchise for 7 films. The Moore era consisted of a lot of silly 1 liners, extravagant gadgets, and some pretty silly stories.

   Then in 1987, we were introduced to the short Timothy Dalton era...I say era because he got 2 films under his belt unlike Lazenby's single entry. Dalton was a breath of fresh air to Bond fans, particularly fans of the books, since he used the source material to model his portrayal, a return to the brutal agent we met in 1962. Bond in the Dalton era had a penchant for avenging the deaths of friends and colleagues, giving Bond a new dark edge. 

   After those 2 entries, the series fell to the wayside due to legal problems for 6 years. When te problems were over, fans were introduced to Bond #5, Pierce Brosnan,,,yes, Remington Steele himself.  In fact, his first entry Goldeneye was quite enjoyable. Brosnan didn't have the hard edge of early Connery or both Dalton entries, but he held his own. However, the new coolness couldn't help the lackluster stories that ensued, and by the time we got Die Another Day, the Brosnan era was long stale.

   And then came Daniel Craig, who brought a new hard edge that surpassed Dalton's big time, and Bond was alive again in 2006 with Casino Royale, the best on-screen vision of that story since a 1954 teleplay featuring an American as Bond....and the 1967 Bond spoof with that title starring David Niven deserves no mention. After that came Quantum of Solace, which seemed like one huge chase scene to me and not much story, so I didn't watch all of it. Skyfall was much better...and then came SPECTRE, which tied the previous 3 films together, a first for the franchise. 

   I'd like to mention the latest film No Time to Die a bit more, but it's too new, and it is too early to tell if it is truly the end or not. ONe thing I do want to note, though, is the return of Bond feeling love again, only losing it but in an entirely, and heroically self-sacrificing, way. This is shown thematically and musically connected to On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

   One thing I need to mention with the franchise is the retconning of a few key characters. The old gruff M was replaced at the start of the Brosnan era with Dame Judi Dench, who was referred as the old man's replacement. After her death in Skyfall, Joint Intelligence Committee chairman Gareth Mallory (played by Ralph Fiennes) became the new M.

   Then there is the villain Blofeld, who in the 60s and early 70s was played by different actors each time, and was last seen being rammed in his bathosub into a control building on an oil rig in Diamonds Are Forever, his fate unknown. In 2015's SPECTRE, his story was rewritten as having a childhood connection to Bond. Felix Leiter was also reintroduced as an African American in Casino Royale.  

   Miss Moneypenny was also rewritten as an agent who retires from active duty to become M's secretary. Q went from a crusty old coot to R (John Cleese) in the final Brosnan films to a much younger man played by Ben Whishaw in the Craig films...I liked this later version, actually.

    Of course, many of the early stories, right up to 2006's Casino Royale had at least some if not more source material to use. The source material was quite British and often very dry. I read most of them and while more than half were pretty easy to get through, a few I couldn't finish, 1955's Moonraker in particular. The early novels had the Soviet group SMERSH as the antagonists, but by 1961 SPECTRE had emerged. The last novels also showed a change of style to longer in depth of description or emotional narrative in the form of long-ass paragraphs. Still, they were enjoyable. I reread a few often and picture Daniel Craig in the role now...and his portrayal fits just about all of them. Another author named John Gardner picked up the Bond book writing in 1981. I liked them for a while, but my current tastes have left those behind.

   With all that said, is there a future for Bond? I'd like to say no, we have many films to enjoy with several different interpretations...yes, even Roger Moore fans have a place (preferably at the bottom of a canyon). However, we all know that the film world is having trouble in the area of originality, and we might see another form of Bond again in my lifetime, probably made by a different production company and likely non-book source material.

   To conclude, Rest in Peace, Mr. Bond.