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Novels

The Bounty Hunters
The Law at Randado
Escape from Five Shadows
Last Stand at Saber River
Hombre
The Big Bounce
The Moonshine War
Valdez is Coming
Forty Lashes Less One
Mr. Majestyk
Fifty-Two Pickup
Swag
Unknown Man No. 89
The Hunted
The Switch
Gunsights
City Primeval
Gold Coast
Split Images
Cat Chaser
Stick
Labrava
Glitz
Bandits
Touch
Freaky Deaky
Killshot
Get Shorty
Maximum Bob
Rum Punch
Pronto
Riding the Rap
Out of Sight
Cuba Libre
Be Cool
Pagan Babies
Tishomingo Blues
Mr. Paradise
A Coyote’s in the House
The Hot Kid
Comfort to the Enemy
Up in Honey’s Room
Road Dogs
Djibouti
Raylan

Stories

The Complete Western Stories of Elmore Leonard
The Tonto Woman and Other Western Stories
When the Women Come Out to Dance
Trail of the Apache
Apache Medicine
You Never See Apaches…
Red Hell Hits Canyon Diablo
The Colonel’s Lady
Law of the Hunted One
Cavalry Boots
Under the Friar’s Ledge
The Rustlers
Three Ten to Yuma
The Big Hunt
Long Night
The Boy Who Smiled
The Hard Way
The Last Shot
Blood Money
Trouble at Rindo’s Station
Saint with a Six-Gun
The Captives
No Man’s Guns
The Rancher’s Lady
Jugged
Moment of Vengeance
Man with the Iron Arm
The Longest Day of his Life
The Nagual
The Kid
The Treasure of Mungo’s Landing
The Bull Ring at Blisston
Only Good Ones
The Tonto Woman
Hurrah for Captain Early
Karen Makes Out
The Odyssey
Sparks
Hanging Out at the Buena Vista
Fire in the Hole
Chickasaw Charlie Hoke
When the Women Come Out to Dance
Tenkiller
Showdown at Checotah
Louly and Pretty Boy
Chick Killer (2011)
Ice Man

Film and TV

Moment of Vengeance
3:10 to Yuma
The Tall T
Hombre
The Big Bounce (I)
The Moonshine War
Valdez is Coming
Joe Kidd
Mr. Majestyk
High Noon, Part II
Stick
52 Pickup
Desperado
The Rosary Murders
Glitz (TV)
Cat Chaser
Border Shootout
Split Images
Get Shorty
Last Stand at Saber River
Pronto
Touch
Elmore Leonard’s Gold Coast (TV)
Jackie Brown
Maximum Bob
Out of Sight
Karen Sisco
The Big Bounce (II)
Be Cool (2005)
The Ambassador
3:10 to Yuma (2007)
Killshot (2009)
Freaky Deaky
The Tonto Woman
Sparks
Justified
Life of Crime

Wednesday, June 11, 2025

New Elmore Leonard Biography

C.M. ‘Chad’ Kushins’ Cooler Than Cool: The Life and Times of Elmore Leonard draws heavily on the work of earlier biographers—David Geherin, Paul Challen, James Devlin, Charles Rzepka, and myself. My contributions include the extensive factual chronology and book-by-book research notes published in Elmore Leonard: The Classic Crime Novels: A Library of America Boxed Set, for which I served as editor—part of the framework of Cooler Than Cool.

Kushins was the first to write a cradle-to-grave biography with full access to the Leonard archives, the richest source material available to a biographer. He drew on a wide range of accounts from people who knew or worked with Dutch, and had unprecedented access to his children, grandchildren, and first wife Beverly. The result is a family-sponsored narrative told from multiple family points of view.

My memoir, I’d Kill to Have Your Job: Getting the Goods for Elmore Leonard, will fill in some of the gaps in Chad’s book and offer a broader, research-driven view. I have an extensive archive of my own—not nearly as comprehensive as the official Elmore Leonard archive—but built over three decades as Dutch’s researcher. It includes documents, audio, video, and a large collection of location photos, all of which inform my book.

Cooler Than Cool is a worthwhile addition to Elmore Leonard scholarship but not the last word.
More to come.

 

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