Bond is back! Birdsong author Sebastian Faulks writes first 007 book for 40 years

But with the legend of James Bond, you never say never again.

The British secret agent is returning in the first Bond book in four decades. And novelist Sebastian Faulks has been revealed as the author.

Devil May Care, the 15th Bond adventure, will be published by Penguin next May to mark the centenary of original writer Ian Fleming's birth.

In keeping with 007 tradition, the book will be set in the Cold War with the action played out across two continents, exotic locations and 'several of the world's most thrilling cities'.

Fleming's last Bond books, Octopussy and the Living Daylights, were published in 1966 following his death from a heart attack two years earlier.

Two years after that Kingsley Amis wrote a further Bond book, Colonel Sun, under the pseudonym Robert Markham. Last year the Fleming estate announced it had commissioned a 'highly respected' writer to revive the Bond brand in print.

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Daniel Craig as James Bond, and Ursula Andress in Dr No.

John Le Carre and Frederick Forsyth were tipped as favourites to write the book. In the end the estate chose Faulks, 54, who is best known for his novels The Girl at the Lion d'Or, Birdsong and Charlotte Gray.

He said yesterday: 'I was surprised but flattered to be asked by the Fleming estate last summer if I would write a one-off Bond book.

'I found writing this light-hearted book more thrilling than I had expected.

'I hope that Ian Fleming would consider it to be in the cavalier spirit of his own novels and therefore an acceptable addition to the line.'

No decision has been made on whether it will be turned into a film but Bond movie producer Barbara Broccoli, who was given a sneak preview of the manuscript, said it was so convincing she would have believed it had been found in a dusty corner of Fleming's basement.