She wouldn't mind using it as the title of her documentary. 'This evening,' we hear, 'she was sneak-shooting Djibouti. Upon arriving in the eponymous former French territory at the mouth of the Red Sea, filmmaker Dara Barr is quite excited. In 'Djibouti,' as it happens, Leonard gives us a novel about a moviemaker and her cameraman, on a quest to make a documentary about Somali pirates. I know that's a mouthful, but he's worth every word of our praise. With his latest novel (getting up toward his 50th publication!), he gives you every advantage of an action film and trumps even the best of them because of his enormous talent at creating characters out of a few lines of description and some of the best dialogue anyone has written since Hemingway. Now that with the power of various pocket-size handheld devices you can virtually hold a movie in your hand and watch it flash past, here comes the master of the movie on the page, the indomitable Elmore Leonard. And there's Jama Raisuli, a black al Qaeda terrorist from Miami, who's vowed to blow up something big.By Elmore Leonard ( William Morrow 279 pages $26.99)

He's promised his girlfriend, Helene, a nifty fashion model, that he'll marry her if she doesn't become seasick or bored while circling the world on his yacht. Billy Wynn, a Texas billionaire, plays mysterious roles as the mood strikes him. The most successful pirate, driving his Mercedes around Djibouti, appears to be a good guy, but his pal, a cultured Saudi diplomat, has dubious connections. They learn soon enough that almost no one in the Middle East is who he seems to be.

Now, looking for a bigger challenge, Dara and her right-hand-man, Xavier LeBo, a six-foot-six, seventy-two-year-old African American seafarer, head to Djibouti, on the Horn of Africa, to film modern-day pirates hijacking merchant ships. She's covered the rape of Bosnian women, neo-Nazi white supremacists, and post-Katrina New Orleans, and has won awards for all three. Elmore Leonard, New York Times bestselling author and 'the hippest, funniest national treasure in sight' ( Washington Post), brings his trademark wit and inimitable style to this twisting, gripping - and sometimes playful - tale of modern-day piracy Dara Barr, documentary filmmaker, is at the top of her game.

Djibouti book by elmore leonard