Elmore Leonard dies at 87--

A great figure in the crime fiction genre has died earlier this week in writer Elmore Leonard.  

A monster talent with success in writing for novels and some even later adapted in movies (I read he thought "Get Shorty" was one of the best efforts of transferring his novel to the big screen) and television (I'm a steady viewer of "Justified"), Leonard enjoyed a long writing career.  

Elmore Leonard
(photo from Google)

From the library's catalog under his "Raylan" book is the Author & Notes Sketches entry which reads: Elmore John Leonard, Jr., popularly known as mystery and western writer Elmore Leonard, was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on October 11, 1925. He served in the United States Naval Reserve from 1943 to 1946. He received a Ph.D. in English from the University of Detroit in 1950. After graduating, he wrote short stories and western novels as well as advertising and education film scripts. In 1967, he began to write full-time and received several awards including the 1977 Western Writers of America award and the 1984 Writers of America Edgar Allan Poe award. His other works include 
Get  Shorty, Out of Sight, Hombre, Mr. Majestyk, 3:10 to Yuma, and Rum Punch. Many of his works were adapted into movies. He successfully conquered alcoholism in the 1970s; details of his struggle with the bottle appear in author Dennis Wholey's 1986 book The Courage to Change. His title Raylan made The New York Times Best Seller List in 2012. Library of America recently announced plans to publish the first of a three-volume collection of his books beginning in the Fall of 2014. Leonard died on August 20, 2013 from complications of a stroke he had earlier. He was 87 years old. (Bowker Author Biography)

For a list of the library's holdings for Leonard (including novels, books on CD, movies, etc.), click here.

The Pix of the Week (from my desk calendar)...

For several years, I've purchased a weekly engagement calendar to prop up on my desk at work to keep up with events and to use for note taking during an occasional meeting. Typically, it would some sort of art, I love Claude Monet's work. This year, though, I purchased Jill Krementz's The Writer's Desk 2009 Calendar--it has great black and white photographs of famous authors--and this week I have photo and quote from writer Elemore Leonard. Here's a photo from the author's website.

And if I remember correctly, I did mention to my library's mystery book club that during a 2005 Time magazine interview, Leonard was described as being "the greatest living writer of crime fiction" by the New York Times. The calendar features Leonard quoting: If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.