JM: For a writer who has plied his trade in what are conventionally seen as well-defined genres, Westerns and crime, your books aren't really plot-driven, even though the plots are extremely entertaining.Visit Elmore Leonard's website.EL: No.
JM: They're character-driven, and the characters are very much creatures as of their speaking voices as anything else.
EL: Well, they have to be able to talk!
JM: But it's more than that; even though your plots are intricate and ingenious, it's language that's shaping them because of the prominence of the voices.
EL: Yes, I agree with that.
JM: Did you have that impulse from the beginning? Did your start out writing that way?
EL: In the early '50s,...[read on]
--Marshal Zeringue