Ian Lancaster Fleming was born in London on 28th May 1908, the second of four brothers. He was educated at Eton College and then abroad in Germany and Austria.

After an early career at Reuters news agency, he became a stockbroker. During World War 2 he worked as assistant to the Director of Naval Intelligence in the Admiralty, London. His experiences in this role were the inspiration for many of the characters and incidents that he was to later write about in the James Bond books.

After World War 2 he became foreign manager, in charge of foreign correspondents, for Kemsley newspapers, owners of the Sunday Times amongst others. It wasn’t until 1952, When, at the age of 43, he settled down in his Jamaican home, and produced – in not much more than two months – Casino Royale, the first James Bond adventure. He published a further thirteen James Bond titles and lived to witness their enormous success, and saw his character played by Sean Connery in the first two films, Dr No and From Russia with Love.

He married Anne Rothermere in 1952 and in August that year his only son, Caspar, was born. While convalescing from his first heart attack in 1962, he wrote a short story about a flying car for Caspar – Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Ian Fleming died, aged 56, on 12th August 1964 at Sandwich in Kent.

1 Casino Royale (1953)
2 Live And Let Die (1954)
3 Moonraker (1955)
4 Diamonds Are Forever (1956)
5 From Russia, With Love (1957)
6 Dr. No (1958)
7 Goldfinger (1959)
8 For Your Eyes Only (1960)
Five secret occasions in the life of James Bond
1 From A View To A Kill
2 For Your Eyes Only
3 Quantum of Solace
4 Risico
5 The Hildebrand Rarity
9 Thunderball (1961)
10 The Spy Who Loved Me (1962)
11 On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1963)
12 You Only Live Twice (1964)
13 The Man With The Golden Gun (1965)
14 Octopussy and The Living Daylights
(1966)
The Property of a Lady – (a story
commissioned by the auction house
Sotheby’s) also appears in paperback
editions of this book.

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