“I’m Always Making It Up As I Go Along”

Finally able to poke my head up briefly above myriad assignments, random editing responsibilities, and planning for a Rap Sheet project that will launch later in the month, I want to direct your attention to author-editor Duane Swierczynski’s outstanding interview with Elmore Leonard at the Philadelphia CityPaper’s Web site. What I know after reading this piece that I didn’t know before:

• Manhattan bookseller and editor Otto Penzler makes a cameo appearance of sorts in Leonard’s new novel, Up in Honey’s Room, playing a former German SS officer.

• Three characters from Leonard’s previous novels have parts in his next one, of which he’s written only about 60 pages so far.

• And he writes his books (41 so far!) on a series of “eight-and-a-half-by-11 yellow pad[s], unlined. It’s the same kind of yellow pad they used at the ad agency [where] I worked, so when I left, I would just go to a print shop and order two thousand pages more. I write everything by hand first. And then it goes on the typewriter. I did get an electric typewriter about 15 years ago. I was afraid of it at first.”