SMERSH (James Bond) Bond again squares off against SMERSH in "Goldfinger" after learning that Auric Goldfinger is the agency's treasurer. After "Goldfinger", SMERSH is mentioned only fleetingly, usually in reference to having been disbanded. In "Thunderball", three former members of SMERSH joined and became top members of the apolitical criminal organization, SPECTRE. In the continuation novels (and novelizations), however, SMERSH returns as an organisation essentially renamed and reorganised within Soviet intelligence. They are first mentioned again in the novelization of "The Spy Who Loved Me", although replaced by KGB in the film. In John Gardner's series of Bond novels, SMERSH is renamed Department
Goldfinger (novel) "Goldfinger", saying "the whole preposterous fantasy strikes me as highly entertaining." Meanwhile, the critic for the "New York Herald Tribune", James Sandoe considered the book to be "a superlative thriller from our foremost literary magician." Anthony Burgess, in Ninety-nine Novels, cited it as one of the 99 best novels in English since 1939. "Fleming raised the standard of the popular story of espionage through good writing — a heightened journalistic style — and the creation of a government agent — James Bond, 007 — who is sufficiently complicated to compel our interest over a whole series of adventures. A patriotic