Books - Role of Honour

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	Books - Role of Honour

Role of Honour (published in American editions as Role of Honor), first published in 1984, was the fourth novel by John Gardner featuring Ian Fleming's secret agent, James Bond. Carrying the Glidrose Publications copyright, it was first published in the United Kingdom by Jonathan Cape and in the United States by Putnam.

Plot summary

After receiving a large inheritance, James Bond 007 is accused of improprieties and drummed out of the British Secret Service. Disgusted with his former employers, Bond places his services on the open market, where he later attracts the attention of representatives of S.P.E.C.T.R.E. who are quite willing to put their one-time enemy on their payroll.

Prior to joinng up, Bond spends a month in Monte Carlo with Miss 'Percy' Proud, a CIA agent who teaches him everything she knows about programming languages and computers in general. This background allows Bond to attract Jay Autem Holy, an agent of S.P.E.C.T.R.E. who left The Pentagon, faked his death, and later started a computer game company that creates simulations based on real-life battles and wars.

Bond's allegiance to S.P.E.C.T.R.E. is periodically questioned throughout the novel, even at one point going so far as to send Bond to a terrorist training camp (known as "Erewhon") to see if he has 'the right stuff'. Proving his worth, Bond becomes involved in a plot to destablise the Soviet Union and the United States, by forcing them to rid the world of their nuclear weapons.

What S.P.E.C.T.R.E. leaders Tamil Rahani and Dr. Jay Autem Holy suspect, but never fully realise is that Bond's resignation is false. Along with Bond, the Secret Service plays a vital role in foiling S.P.E.C.T.R.E.; however, Rahani, the current leader of S.P.E.C.T.R.E. is able to escape Bond's clutches by parachuting out of an airship over Switzerland.

Characters

James Bond
M
Bill Tanner
Q

;Persephone 'Percy' Proud: Formerly Mrs. Jay Autem Holy. Percy is a CIA agent whom went deep undercover by marrying Holy. After Holy's faked death, she teams with Bond to teach him everything she knows about Holy and everything she knows about programming languages and computers in general.

;Jay Autem Holy: Holy supposedly died in a plane crash, prior to the events in Role of Honour. He now goes under the name Jason St. John Finnes and is secretly an agent of S.P.E.C.T.R.E. Holy is an elite computer programmer once working for The Pentagon; he now owns and manages a software company that develops computer game simulations based on real-life wars and battles. He is the former husband of Percy Proud and current husband to Dazzle. Holy is killed by Rahani after finding out he was betrayed.

;General Rolling Joe Zwingli: Zwingli is an accomplice Jay Autem Holy and long-time friend. He also was supposedly killed in the plane crash. Zwingli is killed by one of Rahani's personnel after finding out he was double-crossed.

;Tamil Rahani: Part American Part Lebanese, Rahani is the chairman and principle shareholder of Rahani Electronics and secretly the head of S.P.E.C.T.R.E. He manages the Erewhon terrorist training camp along with his right hand man, Simon. Unlike most of the villains in a James Bond novel or film, Rahani actually lives and flees from capture. Bond is later informed that Rahani was secretly having a love affair with Dazzle, Holy's second wife.

;Freddie Fortune: Fortune is an informant for Bond that he uses to get closer to Holy.

;Cindy Chalmer: Chalmer is a programmer who works for Holy at Endor. She is in league with Percy and an informant for her and the CIA.

;Peter Amadeus: Amadeus is a programmer who works for Holy at Endor. He later escapes with the help of Bond and is used by the British Secret Service to one-up S.P.E.C.T.R.E. He later takes a job within the Secret Service as a computer programmer.

Trivia

Bond purchases a brand new British racing green Bentley Mulsanne Turbo with magnolia interior. Likewise with the Silver Beast, Bond had CCS outfit the car with a long-range telephone and a hidden weapon compartment. Bentley had apparently requested that Gardner not oufit the car with any gadgets other than the telephone.
Gardner was prevented from having a scene in which Bond squares off on a computer game simulation against the novel's villain Jay Autem Holy because of a similar scene in the 1983 film Never Say Never Again. Bond was supposed to be playing a simulation of "The Battle of Waterloo"; however, this was changed to a game based on "The Battle of Bunker Hill". Interestingly, the Battle of Waterloo would later play a part in the official 1987 Bond film, The Living Daylights.
Whether intentional or not, Role of Honour shares a number of similar scenes with the 1985 official Bond film, A View to a Kill. For instance, both stories heavily involve the use of computers and microprocessors, and both have their climax take place in an airship over a city.

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