Get Shorty
by Elmore Leonard · first published 1990
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Mob-connected loanshark Chili Palmer is sick of the Miami grind -- plus his "friends" have a bad habit of dying there. So when he chases a deadbeat client out to Hollywood, Chili figures he might like to stay. This town with its dreammakers, glitter, hucksters, and liars -- plus gorgeous, partially clad would-be starlets everywhere you look -- seems ideal for an enterprising criminal with a taste for the cinematic. Besides, Chili's got an idea for a killer movie -- though it could very possibly kill him to get it made.
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…but The Baroque Cycle (three books) is very good as well. If you're into crime/mystery fiction, the recently deceased Elmore Leonard was one of the best. A few of his books have been made into movies (Get Shorty, Jackie Brown, The Big Bounce) with mixed results, but I do I highly recommend reading the books, which are numerous. For a different sort of fiction, James Clavell's Shogun, Taipan, and Noble House…
on “Ask HN: What literature do you read?” ↗I listed six here: http://jseliger.com/top-five-books : These books are worth reading immediately: 1. Lord of the Rings 2. All the King’s Men 3. High Fidelity 4. Get Shorty 5. Cryptonomicon 6. Almost anything by Robertson Davies, though I recommend starting with The Deptford Trilogy and skipping The Salterton Trilogy
on “Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.” ↗…been broadly popular: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1979), The Da Vinci Code (2003), The Big Sleep (1939), The Color out of Space (1927) (short), The Hunt for Red October (1984), Hondo (1953), Get Shorty (1990).
on “Ask HN: How to transition from non-fiction to fiction reading?” ↗This kind of reminds me of the book Get Shorty and the subsequent movie. About a mafia loan shark moving to hollywood and becoming a producer. Elmore Leonard was very familiar with movie producers by that point in his career, and clearly saw a a…
on “The most-disliked people in the publishing industry” ↗