"A Novelist Who Made Crime an Art, and His Bad Guys ‘Fun’"

Elmore Leonard, the prolific crime novelist whose louche characters, deadpan dialogue and immaculate prose style in novels like “Get Shorty,” “Freaky Deaky” and “Glitz” established him as a modern master of American genre writing, died on Tuesday at his home in Bloomfield Township, Mich. He was 87.

Elmore Leonard, the prolific crime novelist whose louche characters, deadpan dialogue and immaculate prose style in novels like “Get Shorty,” “Freaky Deaky” and “Glitz” established him as a modern master of American genre writing, died on Tuesday at his home in Bloomfield Township, Mich. He was 87.

Elmore Leonard, the prolific crime novelist whose louche characters, deadpan dialogue and immaculate prose style in novels like “Get Shorty,” “Freaky Deaky” and “Glitz” established him as a modern master of American genre writing, died on Tuesday at his home in Bloomfield Township, Mich. He was 87.

Reviewing “Riding the Rap” for The New York Times Book Review in 1995, Martin Amis cited Mr. Leonard’s “gifts — of ear and eye, of timing and phrasing — that even the most indolent and snobbish masters of the mainstream must vigorously covet.”

Reviewing “Riding the Rap” for The New York Times Book Review in 1995, Martin Amis cited Mr. Leonard’s “gifts — of ear and eye, of timing and phrasing — that even the most indolent and snobbish masters of the mainstream must vigorously covet.”

Reviewing “Riding the Rap” for The New York Times Book Review in 1995, Martin Amis cited Mr. Leonard’s “gifts — of ear and eye, of timing and phrasing — that even the most indolent and snobbish masters of the mainstream must vigorously covet.”

Published in 2012, it featured three strong female villains and gave its cowboy hero license to shoot one of them.

It was a major concession for Mr. Leonard to acknowledge his approval of “Justified”; he had long been candidly and comically disdainful of the treatment his books generally received from Hollywood, even in commercially successful films like “Get Shorty,” “Be Cool,” “Out of Sight” and “Jackie Brown” (based on his novel “Rum Punch”).

When asked about the vivid landscapes in his westerns, Mr. Leonard told how he did his “research”: from a magazine.

More often than not, that character would be among his rogues’ gallery of killers, gangsters and con artists.

Mr. Leonard called them “my guys” and delighted in their affable amorality and pragmatic professionalism.

Mr. Leonard called them “my guys” and delighted in their affable amorality and pragmatic professionalism.

He took special pride in the technical skills these gun dealers, loan sharks, bookies, thieves, grifters and mob enforcers brought to their trade.

Whenever one of these alienated protagonists is goaded into action, there’s no telling what he might do.

Whenever one of these alienated protagonists is goaded into action, there’s no telling what he might do.

Whenever one of these alienated protagonists is goaded into action, there’s no telling what he might do.

Although he was galvanized by the pace and patois of the metropolis, Mr. Leonard lived quietly beyond the city’s reach.

His first crime novel, “The Big Bounce,” set in Michigan, was published in 1969 and kicked off a series of them — including “Fifty-Two Pickup,” “Swag,” “Unknown Man No. 89” and the raw genre masterpiece “City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit” — that to his fans define urban noir.

The only thing slightly raffish about this soft-spoken, laconic author was his nickname, Dutch, and the cloth working-guy caps he wore in all kinds of weather.