Grandmaster Lawrence Block

Lawrence Block is one of those amazing people who was just born to write. As this article points out, his early work "ran the gamut from hard-boiled to sleazy. (Which is a fine gamut with me.)" (Me, too, for that matter.)

While I love his dark Matthew Scudder novels, Block is also equally adept at writing with sly humor in his Bernie Rhodenbarr series. He's a man of many talents, whose books are well worth reading.