Beating the Rap

I finished Elmore Leonard's Riding the Rap earlier today and found myself thinking the same thing I always think after reading one of his things: well that was hugely entertaining and obviously really well done; but why do so many generally sensible sort of critics regard him as some kind of genius? He's not at that level, surely. Far too mannered, for one thing. He creates a world at a sort of tangent to reality but there's not enough of a connection to make you, or, rather, me, feel he's saying anything of weight.

I think this must be a bit like how you read Wodehouse, whom I do regard as a genius. Similarly mannered (or, I suppose, dissimilarly mannered) but playing his game to such perfection that the invitation to enter his world is irresistible. I guess some reader feel the same way about Leonard but I'm a bit take it or leave it, all told. I only read this one because I picked it up second hand ultra-cheap the other day.

Mind you, there is one gag about Ezra Pound in the novel that made me laugh out loud, and there aren't too many crime novels you can say that of.