On borrowing Elmore Leonard

When you walk into a new branch library, or stumble across an unfamiliar secondhand bookshop, which writer do you look for? They can’t be too obscure; the idea is to find something. They must be prolific; you’re looking for something that’s new to you. And they must be reliable: you want to be sure that your discovery will be worth your time. The classic answer is PG Wodehouse. Mine has always been Elmore Leonard.

Leonard, whose death was announced today, was a consummate professional pleasure-giver. More than 40 novels over more than 50 years: first westerns, then crime, standard consistently high. His spare style was impressive enough to win both highbrow praise (Martin Amis’s lines on him are already recirculating) and repeated Hollywood adaptation, although his economy and wit proved harder to transfer to the screen than his dialogue.

He could dispense with heroes without abandoning morality – when he invents a sociopath, such as Glitz‘s Teddy Majyk, he doesn’t need the dodgy dark glamour of serial-killer fiction – and bring his characters to a bad end without losing warmth (Freaky