“The Man with the Golden Gun” is Ian Fleming’s final Bond novel, a short, spare farewell that sets 007 against a professional assassin. Published eight months after his death, it struck reviewers of the day as less polished than its predecessors. Some readers still praise its opening and read it as closing an arc begun in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”. It is for readers following Bond to the very end.

The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.

About the book

The Man with the Golden Gun is the twelfth and final novel in Ian Fleming's James Bond series and the thirteenth Bond book overall. It was first published by Jonathan Cape in the United Kingdom on 1 April 1965, eight months after the author's death. The novel was not as detailed or polished as the others in the series, leading to poor but polite reviews. Despite that, the book was a best-seller.

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Where the score comes from

The sources average 6.9 across 56 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 28% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Spy & espionage average of 7.6. That is how 7.4 comes out.