Elmore Leonard Short Quotes

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Try to leave out the parts that readers tend to skip.

Elmore Leonard
Never use the words "suddenly" or "all hell broke loose."

Elmore Leonard
There's nothing like work to take your mind off your worries.

Elmore Leonard
It doesn't have to make sense, it just has to sound like it does.

Elmore Leonard
Never use an adverb to modify the verb "said"... he admonished gravely.

Elmore Leonard
If work was a good thing the rich would have it all and not let you do it.

Elmore Leonard
I spent most of my dough on booze, broads and boats and the rest I wasted.

Elmore Leonard
A line of dialogue is not clear enough if you need to explain how it's said.

Elmore Leonard
I always felt, you don't have a good time doin crime, you may as well find a job.

Elmore Leonard
If an adverb became a character in one of my books, I'd have it shot. Immediately.

Elmore Leonard
What do you tell a man with two black eyes? Nothing, he's already been told twice.

Elmore Leonard
My most important rule is one that sums up the 10. If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.

Elmore Leonard
It's my attempt to remain invisible, not distract the reader from the story with obvious writing.

Elmore Leonard
You do appreciate sex more as you age. The simple fact is there will be fewer and fewer situations.

Elmore Leonard
Keep your exclamation points under control. You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose.

Elmore Leonard
Avoid Prologues. They can be annoying, especially a prologue following an introduction that comes after a foreword.

Elmore Leonard
Alcohol never prevented me from writing. But when I quit — on January 24, 1977, at 9:30 a.m. — my fiction got better.

Elmore Leonard
I like homicide detectives. They wear hats. They wear hats so that other law-enforcement people will know they're homicide.

Elmore Leonard
When you meet somebody who bores you, you have to put up with him until he leaves. But when you meet a boring character, you turn the page.

Elmore Leonard
After 58 years you'd think writing would get easier. It doesn't. If you're lucky, you become harder to please. That's all right, it's still a pleasure.

Elmore Leonard
A man can be in two different places and he will be two different men. Maybe if you think of more places he will be more men, but two is enough for now.

Elmore Leonard
Well, the man don't just have to die, Foley. I mean, he could accidentally hurt himself falling down on something real hard, you know? Like a shiv, or my dick?

Elmore Leonard
These are 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
Never open a book with weather. There are exceptions. If you happen to be Barry Lopez, who has more ways to describe ice and snow than an Eskimo, you can do all the weather reporting you want.

Elmore Leonard
My grandson, Max, who is an all state lacrosse player, once gave me some lacrosse advice: A limp pass is like a limp dick; it doesn't get the job done. I think the same can be said about limp writing.

Elmore Leonard