James Bond in film not to produce any other films based on the "Thunderball" story for a period of ten years following the release of the Eon-produced version in 1965. After the interruption of McClory as producer, Albert Broccoli and Harry Saltzman returned to produce once again. The first four Bond films had been popular in Japan, and Eon decided to take advantage of the market by producing "You Only Live Twice". The film included progressive elements of Japanese culture as part of the background. Lewis Gilbert was appointed director and Ken Adam returned as production designer; Adam built a volcano hideaway set for
You Only Live Twice (novel) Shatterhand, Fleming uses the name of an old café he had seen in Hamburg in 1959 ("Old Shatterhand", a fictional character penned in a series of Western stories along with Winnetou by German writer Karl May) The characterisation of him dressed as a Samurai was taken from the sketch Fleming had come up with thirty five years earlier for a character called Graf Schlick. "You Only Live Twice" was published in the UK on 16 March 1964, by Jonathan Cape and cost sixteen shillings. There were 62,000 pre-orders for the book, a significant increase over the 42,000 advance orders for