Wednesday 9 November 2011

The Scribe who Stole Bond AKA The name's Chase, Jonathon Chase

Q R Markham AKA Quentin Rowan
Q.R. Markham’s Assassin of Secrets — has been  pulled after Markham’s publisher, Mulholland Books, had determined that Markham had lifted his text from other sources.Yep, this  crooked scribe had taken his influence from the successful James Bond series - problem was his influence stretched to plain and simple theft. And he didn't really try and hide it - even the pen name he chose Q R Markham is  a lift from Robert Markham which was the pen name Kingsley Amis used for his one Bond novel, Colonel Sun.

The publishers didn't notice the deception and it was online forum, Commanderbond.net who exposed the scribe who should have known better. CommanderBond.net , spotted several passages in the book that where lifted directly from John Gardner's Licence Renewed and Nobody Lives Forever.


"I do hope the exposure of this act of plagiarism will act as a lesson to others that think they might try to dupe publishers and the public alike. Whether the authors are alive or dead, there are enough fans of popular fiction to come down fast and hard on anyone who tries to rip off their favourite authors. That is the power of fans and I salute and thank you all on behalf of John Edmund Gardner." Simon Gardner, son of Bond continuation author, John Gardner.

Below are some of the lifts from official Bond novels

Markham, P. 18:: “They’re reportedly responsible for the theft of those military maps from Hanoi from the Pentagon last month. A well-protected Mafia don was murdered about a year ago in Cuba. Zero Directorate supposedly supplied the hit man for that job.”


Taken from Raymond Benson’s High Time to Kill: “The maps disappeared from right under the noses of highly trained security personnel. A well-protected Mafia don was murdered about a year ago in Sicily. The Union supposedly supplied the hit man for that job.”

Markham, P. 26: “In the past, he had often found himself bored by the earnest young men who inhabited the workshops and testing areas of G Branch, but the times were changing. Within a week of her arrival, Frnakie had become the target of many seductive attempts by unmarried officers of all ages. Chase had noticed her, and heard the reports. Word was the colder side of Frankie’s personality was uppermost in her off-duty hours.”


From John Gardner, License Renewed: “In the past, he had often found himself bored by the earnest young men who inhabited the workshops and testing areas of Q Branch, but times were changing. Within a week of her arrival, Q Branch had accorded its new executive the nickname of Q’ute, for even in so short a time she had become the target of many seductive attempts by unmarried officers of all ages. Bond had noticed her, and heard the reports. Word was that the colder side of Q’ute’s personality was uppermost in her off-duty hours.”

The curious thing is that the book will now become a sought after collectors items with Bond fans

Synopsis

Mulholland Books presents...ASSASSIN OF SECRETS The agent: Jonathan Chase, the United States' top operative. He will protect and serve his country at all costs. The target: the Zero Directorate, a shadowy organisation who are kidnapping, interrogating and murdering spies. He knows that they will come for him...but not if he finds them first. Chase is on the hunt. But the Directorate lies in wait, and the inescapable truth is that the closer he gets to stopping his enemies, the closer his enemies get to him.




1 comment:

Brian Drake said...

It's sad that for all the effort he put into copying the other books, he could have used the same effort into creating his own universe. Didn't he include any of his own work? One wants to say that he had enough on the ball to get a book deal, but perhaps the "good writing" and "salable concept" that his agent and publisher saw was never his own at all.

If nothing else he's put the Bond books in the news again!

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