Charlie Higson was amused that his adult James Bond story was accused on social media of turning 007 into a 'metrosexual libtard'.
After writing the hugely successful Young Bond book series, the Tufnell Park author was asked to pen a short story to coincide with King Charles' Coronation - and the 70th anniversary of Ian Fleming's debut Bond novel Casino Royale.
Handed the title, and just weeks to complete it by Ian Fleming Publications, he came up with a story about the spy infiltrating anti-Royalist groups to uncover a dastardly plot by a Trumpian pretender to the British throne.
"In any story of this nature you have heroes and baddies. My Bond, like Fleming's Bond, hates any form of extremism and disruption, and dislikes the far Right as much as the far Left," he says.
"I get a lot of people having a go at me on X. Bond is a moral blank slate on which people can project their own idea of him, and for some mine is not the correct idea of what Bond is."
He says the book commission "came completely out of the blue".
"All they had was a title - On His Majesty's Secret Service - and could I come up with an idea for a short story. Whenever you have a coronation people start questioning what is the Royal Family for? What are the alternatives?
"Through my podcast Willy, Willy, Harry, Stee, I had done a history of the British Monarchy, and what appears to be an unbroken line of succession is actually full of usurpers and foreign Royal families being imported.
"So I thought having an Anglo Saxon pretender was a good starting point. Bond realises this plot to overthrow Charles using libertarians and disruptors as useful idiots is a smoke screen for for personal gain and profit."
Like many fans, Higson got to know the character through the movies with Thunderball his first memory.
"That had a big effect on me, I was blown away, it was so exciting. He was not the sort of hero I was used to, he did some dark things."
After writing five Young Bond stories and reading the original books and Fleming's interviews, Higson had absorbed so much Bond lore he was able to write quickly.
"I know what makes Bond tick, I know what Fleming liked to write about and how he used Bond, as long as I kept those attributes it would be ok."
Higson says you have to balance the "easily parodied" trope of name-checking Bond's favourite brands without "describing who made his socks."
"Giving the real names of things gives a great reality to the books even though he lives in a world where a British agent drives the most expensive cars!"
He finds it funny when people forget that Bond is a fantasy "like the Milk Tray man".
"Part of the reason the character lends himself to fresh movie incarnations is that Fleming kept him 35 throughout the series.
"My story is set in the modern world but at one remove, like superhero movies you can suspend your disbelief. You know this is not what happens in the real world, and that gives you a certain leeway.
"You keep certain physical aspects and core traits of bond's personality. Fleming didn't really give him a huge expansive personality or back story but wrote extremely good action sequences. He's a man on a mission, getting on with things. As the strapline to the movies goes 'a man every man wants to be and every woman wants to sleep with'.
"If you keep that at the core and don't put him in a domestic situation you can keep the fantasy that he doesn't have a wife and kid, and doesn't get killed!"
Of course that's exactly what the final Daniel Craig movie did, but Higson says: "The films have to balance keeping it fresh and not putting off younger viewers, with experimenting and seeing what works and doesn't work.
"They had to create a believable contemporary 35-year-old man. You can experiment with Bond - look at how a character like Batman has evolved over the years - as long as you keep the essence of him you can keep reinventing him to what people want in changing times."
Although he has always thought James Norton would make a great James Bond, Higson believes film producers EON will "surprise us again with someone we haven't thought of."
"People wonder how they will get around Bond dying but what is the continuity between Sean Connery and Roger Moore? Every time there's a new actor nobody says 'you've changed Bond.'
"People accept it doesn't have to tie into the previous films, they will start the story again with a new M and Q and new villains. It will be 'Good Morning OO7, and suddenly he is there."
Charlie Higson appears at The Idler Festival which runs July 5-7 at Fenton House, Hampstead.
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