Description

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Drawing on unprecedented archival and family access, Cooler Than Cool: The Life of Elmore Leonard, is the first comprehensive biography of the master American crime writer, author of witty, gritty bestsellers like Get Shorty and Raylan.

Over the course of his sixty-year career, Elmore Leonard, “the Dickens of Detroit,” published forty-five novels that have had enduring appeal to readers around the world. Revered by Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Raymond Carver, and Stephen King, his books were innovative in their blending of a Hemingway-inspired noirish minimalism and a masterful use of realistic dialogue over exposition—a direct evolution spurred by his years as a screenwriter.

Leonard’s fiction contained many layers, and at the heart of his work were progressive themes, stemming from his years as a student of the Jesuit religious order, his personal beliefs in social justice, and his successful battle over alcoholism. He drew inspiration from greats like Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, but the true motivation and brilliance behind his crime writing was the ongoing class struggle to achieve the American Dream—often seen through the eyes of law enforcement officers and the criminals they vowed to apprehend.

C. M. Kushins tells Leonard’s full life story against recurring themes and evolving storytelling methods of his work, drawing on interviews with primary sources ranging from Leonard’s family and friends to those who acted in, produced, and directed his work onscreen. He also includes never-before-published excerpts from Leonard’s unfinished final novel and planned memoir. Definitive and revealing, Cooler Than Cool shows Leonard emerging as one of the last writers of the “pulp fiction” era of midcentury America, to ultimately become one of the most successful storytellers of the twentieth century, whose influence continues to have far-reaching effects on both contemporary crime fiction and American filmmaking. 

About the Author

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C. M. Kushins is the author of Nothing’s Bad Luck: The Lives of Warren Zevon and Beast: John Bonham and the Rise of Led Zeppelin. He has been a freelance journalist for over fifteen years and his work has appeared in High Times and The Daily Beast, among others.

Praise For…

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"For Leonard’s legion of fans the book is a must-read, but you don’t need to be a Leonard fan to enjoy this beautifully crafted life story." - Booklist
"Meticulously researched. . . . A thoroughly researched chronicle of Leonard and his literary career.” - Library Journal
"Consistently engrossing ... Kushins does an excellent job of guiding us through Leonard’s stories, manuscripts and adaptations."  - Wall Street Journal
"Monumental." - Times Literary Supplement (London)
“If you love Elmore Leonard—and who doesn’t?—you’ll love this fascinating, richly detailed account of how one of our greatest storytellers lived his life and learned his craft. - Dave Barry, Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times bestselling author of Swamp Story
"Meticulously researched, Cooler Than Cool gives Elmore Leonard fans not a glimpse, but a fond gaze into the legendary crime novelist's mind and motivations. C. M. Kushins makes exceptional and economical use of Leonard's personal notes and preserved files, to seamlessly chronicle his career and times for a memorable read. Arguably, Kushins was born for the assignment, having since his youth been among Leonard's countless admirers. Detailing the subject's growth from an unknown Detroit copywriter into a literary legend, Cooler Than Cool is a slicker than slick biography worthy of the top shelf." - Eddie B. Allen Jr., author, Low Road: The Life and Legacy of Donald Goines
“A fascinating look at the origins and immense talent of Elmore Leonard. The most influential crime writer of the last half century finally gets the in-depth biography he deserves.” - Charles Ardai, co-founder and editor of Hard Case Crime
"True Leonard fans will love the heavily detailed account, with page after page of facts about the author's 45 books, countless movie scripts and short stories."  - Denver Post
"Exhaustive, though never exhausting...A rich biography of the genre’s greatest writer." - Toronto Star
"Kushins’s biography demonstrates that Leonard, as often as not, was writing much closer to the bone than many of his readers suspected. The sense of nothing going to waste resounds through the book, which excavates Leonard’s relationship to alcohol, his encounters with Hollywood, and his sheer discipline." - New Yorker
“A lively, eventful biography of the eminent—and undeniably cool—writer Elmore Leonard. . . . A welcome celebration of a writer who, word by word and page by page, earned every bit of his fame.” - Kirkus Reviews
“A strong overview of a towering crime novelist’s career, this satisfies.” - Publishers Weekly