Loving Lutz

I just finished listening to the first two books in the Spellman series by Lisa Lutz: The Spellman Files and Curse of the Spellmans. These were great books to listen to. Isabel Spellman is a private investigator from a family of private investigators. She works for Spellman Investigations in San Francisco - the company is Isabel, her mom and her ex-cop dad. Isabel is a sarcastic, heavy drinking, ex-vandal with a bit of a record. She is overly suspicious in everyday life - which leads to family fights and losing over 9 boyfriends. These part-mystery, part-comedy books are quick reads or great listens: narrator Christina Moore gives a fabulous performance.

If you, like me, have finished the first two Spellman books and are left wanting more, there is not long to wait! The third installment, Revenge of the Spellmans, will be released tomorrow (March 10)!

I couldn't wait until March 10, so I did the next best thing - I found a copy of the movie Plan B. This is a 2001 straight to video movie starring Diane Keaton and Paul Sorvino. It was written by Lisa Lutz before she wrote the Spellman books. As movies go, it's not fabulous. But if you have read Lisa Lutz you can find that Spellman humor in this movie, as well as similar themes (she must have a brother - both Isabel Spellman and Fran from Plan B have brothers with OCD). Lisa Lutz wrote an article about her 10 years of writing and rewriting the screenplay of Plan B for Salon.com.

Still, not enough Lisa Lutz for me. So I will be driving into the city on Monday, March 16 to meet the woman behind the sarcasm in person. Lisa Lutz will be at McNally Jackson Books in NYC to sign and read from her new Spellman book.