There are quite a few London locations mentioned in Jeffrey Deaver’s continuation novel Carte Blanche. On page 8 Bond goes to an unnamed “exclusive restaurant off Charing Cross Road with a beautiful woman.” There are several streets that run off Charing Cross Road with numerous restaurants so it’s too vague to make any worthy assumptions.
Ch6
Bond receives a handwritten message requesting his presence for lunch at the Travellers Club in Pall. (Page 33). This is a real place and the history of the building can be found in a link here. Like most clubs in Pall Mall it’s members only. Members have traditionally come from the diplomatic and foreign services, explorers, politics, journalism and the law.
Also mentioned on the same page is the MOD building, described as ‘grey monolithic.’ It’s referred to again on page 127.
Six’s headquarters look rather like a futuristic enclave from a Ridley Scott film (it’s referred to as Babylon-upon-Thames, for its resemblance to a ziggurat, and, less kindly, as Legoland).
On page 238 Deaver also reveals several criteria for working for Mi6.
To work for the ODG or Mi6, you had to be a British citizen and the child of at least one citizen, or someone with substantial ties to the UK. There is also a residency requirement.
Ch7
ODG building is housed in a six-storey Edwardian building on a quiet road, just off Devonshire Street. At a stretch you could make a claim for 12 Devonshire Close being the one. But I have not invested too much time into this.
Ch 8
M scolds Bond for his pursuit of The Irishman and throws in landmarks such as, “Hell, what if you’d followed the Irishman to the London Eye or Madame Tussaud’s?” (Page 48). Incidentally you can find all the Bond’s presently on display at Tussauds, I have documented that in a previous post.
Ch9
In the hunt for the HQ of Green Way, the villains eco-company, there is a couple of London locations mentioned to give the mission some directional context.
Green Way was located nearly twenty miles east of London, well past the boxed sets of office buildings on the Isle of Dogs and the sea-mine of the O2, past the ramble of Canning Town and Silvertown, the Docklands. To reach it you turned south-east off the A13 and drove towards the Thames. (Pg54)
Ch11
As well as being the insititute that holds Blofeld captive in No Time To Die, Belmarsh is also mentioned in Carte Blanche by Osbourne Smith.
I cut my teeth grilling prisoners. In Northern Ireland. And Belmarsh. (Pg70).
Chapter 17
The Commodore a gaming club in Berkeley Square mentioned on Pg106 is fictional.
Cha 18
The restaurant Antoines in Bloomsbury mentioned on Pg110 is fictional.
Chapter 20
Thames House, the home of Mi5, has quite the passage on page 127.
The ninety-year-old grey stone monolith is the sort of place where, were it a police headquarters in Soviet Russia or East Germany, you would begin answering before questions were asked. On the other hand, the place does boast some rather impressive sculpture (Charles Sargeant Jagger’s Britannia and St George, for instance) and every few days tourists from Arkansas or Tokyo stroll up to the front door thinking it’s Tate Britain, which is located a short distance away.
Incidentally these statues are real, I will look to get some images next time I’m in the area.
When Osbourne Smith is ordering his troops to pursue the Irishman, he orders his arrest team aboard the chopper to
[…] hover somewhere near the Gherkin. The forty-storey Swiss Re Office building rising above the City – it looked more like a 1950s spaceship than a pickled cucumber. Pg 131/132.
Ch 21&22
Gatwick Airport’s private runway is mentioned as Bond tails The Irishman. He eventually loses him and needs to book an emrgency private jet to Dubai. Pg138/144 /145. We would not see Bond return to London until much later in the book.
Ch44
Bond runs in Regent’s Park in 293,
When he is in London, Bond spent at least an hour a day exercising and running, using the ODG’s gym and jogging along the paths of Regent’s Park.
Bond also jogs in Regent’s Park in a deleted scene in the film Skyfall.
Ch 46
Reference to Chelsea Flower Show being a hindrance page 312,
Bond was not an aficionado of botany – his customary reaction to the Chelsea Flower Show was irritation at the traffic problems it caused around his home – […].
Ch47
Portobello Road Market mentioned, Pg 320
Mary Goodnight was forever reporting excitedly on bargains she’d found in London’s Portobello Road market […].
On page 321 Islington is mentioned in reference to the Clerkenwell Murders and crime syndicate of the 1980s. An interesting and true area of British history, of which I must confess I’ve not heard of until now. There is information on WIKI.
Ch54
Duke of York’s Theatre is mentioned pg371. This is a real place. There is a loose connection with Samantha Bond who played Moneypenny through the Brosnan tenure, performed in a play there. Found on the FSWL site.
Ch72
Some extra randoms:
- Piccadilly Circus tube pg463
- Curry house Brick Lane, no specific name pg465
- Clapham in a pram pg466
