After Kent Haruf’s 1999 novel Plainsong was a finalist for the National Book Award, he became an overnight sensation at the age of 56 (after having written for decades). With spare, understated writing, he brought to life a fictitious small town in eastern Colorado in the subsequent novels Eventide and Benediction. He had just finished Our Souls at Night this summer, which his wife is copy editing now (she is said to have told him “Don’t you die before you finish it.”). Tragically, he died of complications from a lung disease just last week at the age of 71. You can hear his 2004 interview with Leonard after publishing Eventide.