Elmore Leonard: Easy on the Adverbs, Exclamation Points and Especially Hooptedoodle

The New York Times ^ | July 16, 2001 | Elmore Leonard

[EveningStar]

WRITERS ON WRITING; Easy on the Adverbs, Exclamation Points and Especially Hooptedoodle

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. If you have a facility for language and imagery and the sound of your voice pleases you, invisibility is not what you are after, and you can skip the rules. Still, you might look them over.

[EveningStar]

Elmore Leonard, Who Refined the Crime Thriller, Dies at 87

Crime novelist Elmore Leonard dies at 87

Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing

Wikipedia

IMDb

Official website

[EveningStar]

ping

[EveningStar]

1. Never open a book with weather.
2. Avoid prologues.
3. Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue.
4. Never use an adverb to modify the verb "said”…he admonished gravely.
5. Keep your exclamation points under control. You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose.
6. Never use the words "suddenly" or "all hell broke loose."
7. Use regional dialect, patois, sparingly.
8. Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.
9. Don't go into great detail describing places and things.
10. Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.

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

[Covenantor]

Easy on the Adverbs, Exclamation Points....

Didn't seem to hurt Robert Ludlum book sales any!! He bought them wholesale!!!! In lots of hundreds!!!!!!

[who_would_fardels_bear]

11. Never have hundreds of staff members generate 2000+ pages of Hooptedoodle that you don’t even bother to read.

[KC Burke]

It is sad to hear he has passed away. It had appeared he was recovering from his recent stroke.

Justified, the TV series, is the latest example of his work, but going back he wrote 3:10 to Yuma and Mr Majestyk as well as the Get Shorty / Be Cool pair.

Great writer with 26 stories going to film or TV.

[BenLurkin]

“If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.”

Good advice.

[Anitius Severinus Boethius]

I have that list printed out beside my keyboard where I write. His advice and style of writing will heavily influence me until I publish my last novel.

[Liberty Valance]

Thundercouds decended into the canyon and suddenly all hell broke loose!!!!
Rest in peace Mr. Leonard.

[Fiji Hill]

Never open a book with weather.

"It was a dark and stormy night, the rain fell in torrents..."

Never use an adverb to modify the verb "said”

"I ate a hot dog," he said frankly.

[Veto!]

Never have hundreds of staff members generate 2000+ pages of Hooptedoodle that you don’t even bother to read.

Seems you're referring to Patterson & Co. Blech.

[Revolting cat!]

(12) Never write airport bookstore trash.

[Myrddin]

Avoid sesquipedalian bafflegab? :-)

I couldn't resist. Still laughing.

[perez24]

I did not realize he wrote Mr. Majestyk. I love that movie.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

Actually I was referring to Pelosi and company, but come to think of it there’s really no difference between Patterson, Pelosi, and what Kincaid managed a few years back.

[Daffynition]

Sadness.

[Daffynition]

Sadness.

[Veto!]

Actually I was referring to Pelosi and company

Oh that 2000 pages. Even worse writing than Patterson.

[Gamecock]

Well, maybe I don’t use my exclamation points as haphazardly as you do.

[Larry Lucido]

But what if it WAS a dark and stormy night??!! (I inquired gravely).