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2007 - The Year in Review

2007 was a busy year for Elmore and his fans.

Up in Honey’s Room (Novel)

In May, Elmore’s latest novel, Up in Honey’s Room was released.  This book completed the “Webster Saga” that began in Cuba Libre with Virgil Webster, and continued with his son, Carl, in the novel, The Hot Kid, and Comfort to the Enemy (a New York Times Magazine serial novel.)  Carl also appeared in two short stories, Showdown at Chechotah and Louly and Pretty Boy.  Carl’s grandson, Ben, appeared in the novella, Tenkiller, in the collection, When the Women Come out to Dance.

3:10 to Yuma (Film)

Next came the film, 3:10 to Yuma starring Russell Crowe and Christian Bale.  This film was a remake of the 1957 classic of the same name.  Note, it was not a remake of Elmore’s story, but rather the movie.  Elmore was never consulted about this production nor did the director, James Mangold, ever take the time to even call him.  Probably because Elmore would have called him on some lame mistakes.  Nonetheless, 3:10 to Yuma did reasonably well at the box office (53.5 million domestically) and tops many year end top ten movie lists, so who cares what the author thinks, right?

The Tonto Woman  (Short Film)

Elmore wrote the short story, The Tonto Woman in 1982, well after his western short story period ended the 1950s.  The story is of a cattle thief who stumbles upon a woman tattooed on her face by Tonto Apaches.  Upon her return to civilization, she is banished to a line shack on the edge of her husband’s property.  The short film is beautifully shot in Almería, Spain with noteworthy performances by Francesco Quinn (son of Anthony Quinn) and Charlotte Asprey.  The Tonto Woman won short film awards in Palm Springs and Los Angeles.  The producers are hoping for an Academy Award nomination and have discussed expanding the short to feature length.

Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing (Non-Fiction Book)

By now, unless you’re living under a rock, you have heard of Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing.  They were originally published in The New York Times in a thousand word essay and have been widely disseminated on the Internet.  Gregg Sutter felt they should be made into a special little gift book with illustrations.  Elmore and his publisher agreed.  Illustrator Joe Ciardiello was enlisted to do the excellent illustrations.  Somehow the “little” book aspect was lost and The Rules with it’s uber-thick pages is the depth of a paperback.  But it is a beautiful book published in a standard and limited edition.  Critics charge that it is mostly white space with the words spread out to pad the book. They don’t get it. It’s an art book.  True believers understand that Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing is a wonderful book and a prized collectible, whose spare words speak volumes to any writer.

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Way to Go, John

Our own John McFetridge makes his move.

The Calgary Herald (Alberta)
Mike Harrison

Mystery writer Mike Harrison didn’t hesitate when asked for his three favourite reads of the year—which didn’t have to be published this year—even though he’s got more than a few titles on the go.

Dirty Sweet by John McFetridge

“It’s a street-nasty ride from start to finish. It’s about shady characters from realtors to bikers to cops and it’s a gritty take on the seedy underbelly of Toronto involving drugs and hookers and cars and clubs and everything in between. If you like Elmore Leonard‘s writing style you’ll absolutely love John McFetridge. He has a fast, damn-I-wish-I’d-written-that style that pulls you in from the top of page one. A truly awesome read—and this guy’s Canadian, picked as one of the top 10 Canadian writers to watch by Quill & Quire Magazine.”

 

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Audio Archives - Elmore on “Bookworm”

The Virginian-Pilot(Norfolk, VA.)

Enjoy some New Year’s down time with the audio archives of “Bookworm,” the syndicated radio show in which Michael Silverblatt interviews writers and poets such as Dorothy Allison, Jim Crace, Dave Eggers, Elmore Leonard and Alice Sebold. You’ll need the Real Audio Player (free). http://www.lannan.org/lf/audio/bookworm-archives/

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The Source of Elmore’s “Trademark Dialogue”?

Sunday Times (London)
BYLINE: John Dugdale

Up in Honey’s Room (Weidenfeld £ 12.99) is an Elmore Leonard oddity -a serio-comic spy thriller set in America, mostly during the second world war. Its heroine, Honey Deal, has somehow got married to a boring German butcher called Walter who reveres Hitler. She divorces him, but when US marshal Karl Webster comes to Detroit to investigate a colourful German spy ring, she is able to introduce him to Walter’s circle -not for patriotic reasons, it seems, but because she’s attracted to Webster. It is hard to discern what Leonard is up to, but the aim seems to be to evoke the era of his teenage years while remaining within the genre-fiction framework where he feels comfortable. The novel can also be seen as a homage to 1940s films, making clear that his trademark dialogue comes straight from screwball comedy.

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John Patterson suggests a few retrospective improvements to make it a vintage movie year

The Guardian (London)
The Guide: film: If only… we could do some reshoots of 2007. John Patterson suggests a few retrospective improvements to make it a vintage movie year
BYLINE: John Patterson

When are they going to invent that time machine I need in order to make the year 2007 retroactively perfect? To hell with the Butterfly Effect and not tampering with the past because it buggers up the present, I need to rewrite some history, retouch some photos, destroy some reputations and settle some scores. Bring it on!

At some point I’d have to drop in and persuade Quentin Tarantino that he seems to be all washed up, notwithstanding the release this year of two movies - Smokin’ Aces and Shoot ‘Em Up - that still slavishly imitate QT a decade after he became passe. And even if, technically, they imitate his imitators, well, it’s still his fault. He couldn’t even persuade his sugardaddy Harvey Weinstein to give Grindhouse a decent release. Perhaps I could persuade him to film another Elmore Leonard novel, like the one good QT movie not entirely built out of other movies, Jackie Brown. Say, 3:10 To Yuma, which badly needed his subversive ministrations.

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Essay: Putting the classics on a diet

BYLINE: Frank Wilson, The Philadelphia Inquirer
http://go.philly.com/frankwilson

The last commandment in Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing (Morrow, $14.95) declares that an author should “try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.” The people at Phoenix Press think a number of classic authors were negligent in observing this rule. Anna Karenina, for instance, weighs in at a whopping 800-plus pages. Who can possibly hope to read that and still have time to watch Dancing With the Stars?

“The great classics contain passionate romance, thrilling adventure, interesting characters, and unforgettable scenes and situations,” Phoenix generously acknowledges. “But finding the time to read them . . . can be a problem.” Their solution? Compact Editions: “Now,” they tell us, “these masterpieces have been sensitively and intelligently condensed, retaining both the author’s own words and all the drama of the original!” The first six Compact Editions—Melville’s Moby-Dick, Dickens’ David Copperfield, Thackeray’s Vanity Fair, Tolstoy’s Anna, George Eliot’s The Mill on the Floss, and Mrs. Gaskell’s Wives and Daughters—arrived in bookstores in September.

 

Read More>

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Relocating the Rules

Somebody apparently moved six copies of Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing from the Writing section of a major chain bookstore where it languished, to the very front of the store by the door.

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“A Weeki Wachee Mermaid Comes in Handy”

http://www.weekiwachee.com/

Often when a book or movie reaches for Great Florida Myth quirkiness, a Weeki Wachee mermaid comes in handy.

Consider Elmore Leonard’s classic Sunshine State noir novel “Maximum Bob,” where the title character’s wife, Leanne, is a psychic and Weeki Wachee mermaid gone to seed. (She had retired abruptly after an alligator had made its way into the mermaid tank. Something that has been known to happen.)

Leonard’s novels picture Florida as just the kind of place where a girl might meet her husband while swimming in a fishtail and breathing through a hose. Additional proof, as though more were needed, that this is not a normal state.

And now it seems that future Leannes could be state employees. Like park rangers, corrections officers and assistant undersecretaries of community affairs. Proof, as though more were needed, that this not a normal state government

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Read More>

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Up in Honey’s Room - “Enjoy the Ride”

Herald Sun (Australia)
Honey is queen bee
BYLINE: SUSANNAH GODDARD

HIS is a familiar name to anyone who’s perused a bookshop in the past couple of decades.

Even for non-readers, the popular films based on his prolific writings, such as Get Shorty, Jackie Brown and Out of Sight, have made Elmore Leonard a major name.

Despite this ubiquity I realised with some surprise that I’ve never actually read any of his novels. So what better place to start than with his 43rd and latest?

Leonard brings together a marshal from Oklahoma, a few Nazis, a Ukrainian countess and her transvestite personal attendant, the FBI and a heroine with the Bond-like name of Honey Deal, as in honey of a deal, presumably.

This unlikely cast is in Detroit in the last days of World War II. Two German prisoners-of-war on the lam are being sheltered by a group of inept spies.

One of the group is cooking up a plan to make him famous enough to cast even Himmler, whom he suspects of being his twin, into obscurity.

It is a world where the dames are smart and sassy and not averse to a little nudity.

The men are in homburgs and lung cancer doesn’t seem to be a blip on anyone’s radar.

For some reason the dialogue with all its non-sequiturs seems to compel you to read it in a Humphrey Bogart drawl.

Leonard recycles a few characters. Hero of The Hot Kid, Marshal Carl Webster and his dad Virgil, another hero from Cuba Libre, return in this black-and-white movie world. Carl’s a laconic man of his word, trying hard to remember his wedding vows as the nonchalant Honey and her assets enter rooms with memorable lines such as ``Seig Heil, y’all, I’m Honey Deal’‘.

Despite the plot not really ever going anywhere, it’s a quirkily addictive read. Don’t try to analyse it too much—just give in and enjoy the ride.

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Shop Online for Elmore’s Rules

Somebody you know really needs this book.

This concise book, richly illustrated by Joe Ciardiello, makes a wonderful and engaging gift for any writer. - Gotham Writer’s Workshop

“These are the rules I’ve picked up along the way to help me remain invisible when I’m writing a book, to help me show rather than tell what’s taking place in the story.”—Elmore Leonard

For aspiring writers and lovers of the written word, this concise guide breaks down the writing process with simplicity and clarity. From adjectives and exclamation points to dialect and hoopetedoodle, Elmore Leonard explains what to avoid, what to aspire to, and what to do when it sounds like “writing” (rewrite).

Beautifully designed, filled with free-flowing, elegant illustrations and specially priced, Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing is the perfect writer’s—and reader’s—gift.

This special signed and numbered limited edition is destined to become a collector’s item.

Gorgeous printing on the finest art book stock
A beautiful cloth, foil-embossed binding, with real leather spine
A full cloth slipcase
Stunning 4-color marbled endpapers
Satin ribbon marker
And of course, the signed, numbered first page of the book making this a collector’s item for Elmore Leonard fans, and all other book lovers
A beautiful book that will be the highlight of any writer’s bookshelf.

Amazon
Standard Edition
Limited Edition
Barnes and Noble
Standard Edition
Limited Edition

 

 

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