You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed,

or you are the only animal,

who can think, who can reason, who can read.

Hi, this is Mike Silverblatt, and this is Bookworm.

Today we have a unique show.

Elmore Leonard is with us, the great writer of thrillers.

Most recently, Killshot, a book just published by William Morrow,

author of two of the bestsellers, Freaky Diki and Glitz.

And with us also is John Steppling, Los Angeles playwright.

Steppling is a writer whose work almost depends on a variety of extremely colloquial effects,

street language.

It's a kind of working class theater that Steppling has created, and he had done work on a screenplay of Elmore Leonard's novel

52 Pickup. I thought it would be interesting first to talk to John Stepling and then to allow Steppling to interview Elmore Leonard.

Hi, John.

Hi, Michael.

I wanted to begin by asking, is it, I know that your interest in literature and your interest in working class characters

has led you frequently to the mystery novel.

Is there a kind of class system of genre?

I don't know if there's, I mean, if there is in fact a class system.

I suppose there are people that impose one on it in some sense.

You know, I have always thought that people like Raymond Chandler and the better crime

...