Get Shorty: A Novel

· Mariner Books · Narrated by Joe Mantegna
5.0
2 reviews
Audiobook
8 hr 44 min
Unabridged
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About this audiobook

New York Times Bestselling Author

“Brilliant...impressive...superb.” —Washington Post Book World

“A Hollywood hit....Taut, inimitable prose and characters who could have only sprung from the mind of Elmore Leonard.” —Detroit News

The classic New York Times bestseller that introduced Chili Palmer—a masterful social comedy that happens to be about criminals (and other fast operators).

The Chicago Tribune has dubbed Elmore Leonard, “the coolest, hottest writer in America.” In the same league as the legendary great ones—John D. MacDonald, Dashiell Hammett, James M. Cain—the “King Daddy of crime writers” (Seattle Times) demonstrates his remarkable mastery with Get Shorty, one of the most adored of his forty-plus novels. The basis of the hit movie starring John Travolta and Danny DeVito, Get Shorty chronicles the over-the-top, sometimes violent Hollywood misadventures of a Florida mob loan shark who chases a deadbeat client all the way to Tinseltown and decides to stick around and make movies. Get Shorty’s shylock protagonist, Chili Palmer, is a truly inspired creation—as memorable as another unforgettable Leonard hero, U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens of the hit TV series Justified—and readers will relish his moves and countermoves in this electrifying, funny, bullet train-paced winner from “the greatest crime writer of our time, perhaps ever!” (New York Times Book Review)

Ratings and reviews

5.0
2 reviews
Andrea Romance
April 16, 2025
Tired of the Miami mob, loan shark Chili Palmer heads to Hollywood to collect a debt and finds a new hustle: the movie business. The novel combines crime fiction with satire of the film industry. The characters are hilarious and the plot engaging. I enjoyed the audiobook narration by Joe Mantegna. Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.
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About the author

Elmore Leonard wrote more than forty books during his long career, including the bestsellers Raylan, Tishomingo Blues, Be Cool, Get Shorty, and Rum Punch, as well as the acclaimed collection When the Women Come Out to Dance, which was a New York Times Notable Book. Many of his books have been made into movies, including Get Shorty and Out of Sight. The short story “Fire in the Hole,” and three books, including Raylan, were the basis for the FX hit show Justified. Leonard received the Lifetime Achievement Award from PEN USA and the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America. He died in 2013.

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