Elmore Leonard was born in New Orleans on October 11, 1925, so is celebrating his 85th birthday next week. In the 1950s, he wrote western novels and short stories, and finished his first crime novel, The Big Bounce, in 1969. In 1984, La Brava was voted the best novel by the Mystery Writers of America. In 1995, Get Shorty was made into a hit movie, which further spread the word about Leonard. He’s won 14 major literary awards; and his work has been made into 21 feature films, seven television movies and three TV series, including the current hit FX’s Justified (starring Timothy Olyphant). He’s been on the New York Times bestseller list 17 times, and with William Morrow’s publication of Djibouti (his 44^th novel) on October 12, 2010, it will be 18.

You can help celebrate “the Dicken of Detroit’s” birthday by sending him a birthday card from a special Harper Collins website.