Book Review: The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz
Reviewed by Angela Arlia

	a	aaaat's rare that a book makes me laugh out loud. When a book is funny enough to go past my internal laughter mechanism, and make me guffaw, I take notice. The book I'm talking about is The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz. aaaaThe beauty of this book is that it deals with three intriguing themes: The first is dysfunctional families, the second is private investigation and the third, albeit a slight theme, is a mystery that needs to be solved. aaaaThe heroine of Lutz's story is one Isabel Spellman, who has been working in her parent's private investigation firm since she was a pre-teen. She's incredibly appealing and realistic character, who has many faults, and a fresh hip voice. This makes us willingly follow her on her ride through a very interesting period in her life as well as that of her family. We get a listing of Isabel's boyfriends and learn about her relationship with boyfriend #9 and how
that relationship failed. We see her struggle for independence from this quirky family. This struggle also includes teaching her younger sister Rae a lesson or two about how to mind your own business--something hard to do in this kind of dysfunctional family, especially when many of her family members are used to recreational surveillance. (Whenever a family is more dysfunctional than mine, I immediately stand up and applaud.) Without giving away the farm, let's just say there are pointed discussions on how to negotiate with/blackmail family members, and a family member who often takes "Lost Weekends." aaaaMy only complaint as a reader is that it takes a while before the true suspense and mystery of the novel take place. Even so, that wasn't enough to dull the overall pleasure of the read, as the book's somewhat slow beginning is offset by the background information on Spellman's family, which is so hilarious and unpredictable, it will leave you with paper cuts from turning pages so quickly. Further, the first half of the book appears to be setting the foundation for a series of books based on the Spellman family and some of their bizarre cases, which deepens our interest in the characters and their adventures, impatient for the next installment.