SOURCE: "Canned Politics and Lovely Rascals," in Christian Science Monitor, January 28, 1987, p. 19.

In the following mixed review of Bandits, D'Evelyn asserts that the novel does not live up to Leonard's abilities as a "master craftsman" of crime novels.

Elmore Leonard is everywhere. After 24 novels, salty-bearded, high-domed, he squints out at us affably from behind his big specs—a blue-collar, wiry version of Mr. Magoo. He's a media star.

Since his early days as a writer of Westerns (his oldest fans continue to prefer them to his crime novels), Leonard's reputation has grown steadily. It took years to crest with Glitz (1984). With his newest book, Bandits, the wave has broken, and Leonard has definitely arrived.

Leonard is a master craftsman. He specializes in local color (Detroit, Florida's Gold Coast, Atlantic City, New Orleans), patterns of sloppy but undeniably American speech, a Hemingwayesque use of negative space (what he leaves...