Colonel Sun - a James Bond novel written by Robert Markham, a pen-name of Kingsley Amis and the only Bond novel written after the death of original author Ian Fleming until 1981 when John Gardner was appointed to write a further 16 Bond novels. Originally published by Cape, the copyright owners Glidrose commissioned this edition by

The Companion Book Club in 1968, same year as the Cape first edition. The Companion Book Club edition has the same decorative map endpapers as the Cape edition but has a different jacket design by the noted artist Barry Wilkinson, an Associate Of The Royal College Of Art. 

This copy is in outstanding condition with pristine boards and endpapers and bright pages. No inscriptions or labels. The jacket is also outstanding with no tears or splits and with minimal signs of usage. Jacket spine is lightly sun-toned.

Colonel Sun was published after the death of Bond creator Ian Fleming. Robert Markham was the pen-name of the famous author Kingsley Amis  who was an expert on the Bond books and was already the author of The James Bond Dossier and The Book Of Bond (both 1965) which examined the Bond phenomena. 

Colonel Sun is an important element of the Bond series as although it was never filmed, aspects of it were used in several subsequent Bond movies (Die Another Day, The World Is Not Enough and Spectre) and in my view it is an essential addition to any Bond collection as it is an important aspect of the development of the Bond franchise.