Pam Grier shops her autobiography

BUYING TIME Knopf, which lost Michael Crichton to HarperCollins in February, has been hit with another major defection: legal thriller writer Richard North Patterson, who just struck a two book, seven figure deal with Ballantine. ”It’s been a marvelous run with [Patterson], but he has wanted to get back to his original publisher in both hardcover and paperback, and we respect that,” says Knopf spokesman William Loverd.

Elmore Leonard will also have a new home. The cult crime writer has left Delacorte for the William Morrow division of HarperCollins, which will publish not only his next three hardcovers — beginning next February with ”Tishomingo Blues” (love those crazy titles, Dutch) — but also the master’s entire 36 title backlist.

And speaking of Elmore Leonard, legendary blaxploitation siren Pam Grier — who played Jackie Brown in Quentin Tarantino’s adaptation of Leonard’s ”Rum Punch” — is shopping her autobiography.

And hit man Phil Ramone — possibly the only record producer to have worked with both Bob Dylan and Barbra Streisand — will spill his producing secrets in the tentatively titled ”Making Records,” just acquired by Hyperion. ”It’s not going to be a straightforward memoir,” says senior editor Maureen O’Brien. ”It’s going to be the pope of pop taking you behind the closed doors of where hit records have been made.”