Kim Sherwood on writing a Double O trilogy built around Bond’s absence, and what happens when Fleming’s world moves into a more unstable age.
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Kim Sherwood’s Double O trilogy begins with a simple but risky idea: James Bond has disappeared, and the world he occupied has to continue without him at the centre.
In this episode of The 007 Files, Javi Trujillo and Bill Koenig talk to Sherwood about what it means to write inside Ian Fleming’s world without turning the books into imitation Fleming. Bond is present through his absence, but the trilogy is not simply waiting for him to return. Instead, it opens up the wider Double O Section and asks what that world looks like when other agents step forward.
Sherwood talks about her own route into Bond, from watching Pierce Brosnan on television to seeing Die Another Day at the cinema, and then discovering Fleming through From Russia, with Love at the age of 12. She did not understand everything in the novel at the time, but she was struck by the style, the precision and the atmosphere.
The conversation goes into how she used Fleming’s books as a foundation while still giving the trilogy its own shape. Felix Leiter, old connections and hidden threads from the novels all have their place, but the books also belong to the present. Climate change, disinformation, AI surveillance, military trauma, Brexit, Afghanistan and a more unstable global order sit behind the story.
There is also a strong section on process, including how she maps the trilogy visually, her first-hand experience of Russian hotels, trauma and the emotional cost of service. She also explains how her new Double O agents came together, including the story of writing to Joanna Harwood, Bond’s first screenwriter, then in her 90s and living on a yacht.
One of the most interesting threads in the interview is ambition. Sherwood once said out loud that she wanted to write James Bond, which sounds almost absurd until it becomes true. This conversation shows how seriously she took that ambition, and how a private dream eventually became three official Bond novels with her name on the cover.
Where to find us
Kim Sherwood
https://www.kimsherwoodauthor.com/
Bill Koenig
https://hmssweblog.wordpress.com
Javi Trujillo
https://bsky.app/profile/javitru.bsky.social or https://www.instagram.com/thebondisnotenough
Recorded in the UK and USA on 1st June 2026.
