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My most important piece of advice to all you would-be writers: when you write, try to leave out all the parts readers skip.
Elmore Leonard
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Elmore Leonard
Age: 87 †
Born: 1925
Born: October 11
Died: 2013
Died: August 20
Author
Film Producer
Novelist
Prosaist
Screenwriter
Writer
New Orleans
Louisiana
Dutch Leonard
Elmore John Leonard Jr.
Would
Advice
Reader
Pieces
Leave
Skip
Write
Readers
Important
Parts
Writing
Piece
Trying
Writers
More quotes by Elmore Leonard
Not dreams but night changes, not destiny but path changes, always keep your hopes alive, luck may or may not change, but time definitely chages.
Elmore Leonard
I want the reader to know what's going on. So there's never a mystery in my books.
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I have fun writing. I don't make it a chore. I don't have to struggle with it.
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Bad guys are not bad guys twenty-four hours a day.
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I don't judge in my books. I don't have to have the antagonist get shot or the protagonist win. It's just how it comes out. I'm just telling a story.
Elmore Leonard
If work was a good thing, the rich would have it all and not let you do it.
Elmore Leonard
There's nothing like work to take your mind off your worries.
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
I won't read a book that starts with a description of the weather. I don't read books over 300 pages, though I'll make an exception for Don Delillo.
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
Don't worry about what your mother thinks of your language.
Elmore Leonard
If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.
Elmore Leonard
Never use an adverb to modify the verb 'said' . . . he admonished gravely. To use an adverb this way (or almost any way) is a mortal sin. The writer is now exposing himself in earnest, using a word that distracts and can interrupt the rhythm of the exchange.
Elmore Leonard
Never use the words 'suddenly' or 'all hell broke loose.'
Elmore Leonard
I never see my bad guys as simply bad. They want pretty much the same thing that you and I want: they want to be happy.
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
Skip the boring parts.
Elmore Leonard
If you take a few days to write an outline, you're just making up scenes that you think will work, that you think will be interesting. But as you write it, other ideas occur - better ideas that have to do with what you're writing.
Elmore Leonard
I left advertising as fast as I could in 1961. And I haven't ever thought about going back.
Elmore Leonard
It doesn't have to make sense, it just has to sound like it does.
Elmore Leonard
