For James Bond's legions of males fans (this possibly includes your father), Charlie Higson's "SilverFin" is news of the best kind. Not for this reviewer, though, who belongs to the female half of the planet and whose grouse is that there are already way too many films and books about this world-class spy (and world-class cad). So a children's book about Bond as a boy could only be approached with grave misgivings -- and admittedly just a little curiosity about what Bond was like as a boy. Come to think of it, was he ever a boy?
Evidently he was, and led a life no less exciting for being younger. The opening chapter is dramatic enough. Boy goes fishing to Loch Silverfin; boy catches more than he bargained for; and the reader is hooked (pun intended).
From gruesome beginning to climactic end, Higson seems to constantly remind his readers that this is no mystery novel for the feeble-hearted. Bond may only be cutting his teeth here, but the world is just as ruthless as it will be when he grows up to save it.