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New York Times-bestselling author Lisa Lutz conspires with-or should we say against?- coauthor David Hayward to write an original and hilarious tag-team crime novel.
Meet Paul and Lacey Hansen: orphaned, pot-growing twentysomething siblings eking out a living in rural Northern California. When a headless corpse appears on their property, they can't exactly dial 911, so they move the body and wait for the police to find it. Instead, the corpse reappears, a few days riper . . . and an amateur sleuth is born. Make that two.
When collaborators Lutz and Hayward (former romantic partners) start to disagree about how the story should unfold, the body count rises, victims and suspects alike develop surprising characteristics (meet Brandy Chester, the stripper with the Mensa IQ), and sibling rivalry reaches homicidal intensity. Think Adaptation crossed with Weeds. Will the authors solve the mystery without killing each other first?
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Inspired perhaps by those round-robin collaborations published 75 years ago by England's Detection Club, Lutz (The Spellmans Strike Again, 2010, etc.) and Hayward add a new twist: The two collaborators, each responsible for alternating chapters, are in sharp disagreement about how the tale should be told.
When she finds a headless corpse on her California farm, Lacey Hansen can't call the cops because they'd see that she and her brother Paul were growing marijuana. Instead, they dump the remains in a suitably remote location before they realize that the dead man was their old schoolmate Darryl Cleveland. Or maybe he wasn't, as Lacey realizes when Darryl turns up alive. Now it looks like the murder victim must be Paul's old friend and mentor, veteran cannabis grower Terry Jakes. At least according to Lutz, whose chapter identifies him as such. But Hayward, unwilling to bid farewell to such a promising character, brings him back to life—hey, didn't Lutz do it?—before Lutz emphatically kills him off again when it's her turn. And so it goes and goes, with Lutz demanding in the exchange of notes that end each installment that Hayward develop clues that will solve the mystery, and Hayward observing that Lutz, whose preferred resolution to any untoward complications is to cut the Gordian knot by another murder, must be "the Pol Pot of mystery writing."
The surprise here is how little all this whimsical metatextual byplay changes the formula of alarums, excursions, red herrings and other tangents beloved of the genre; it just invites the authors to join the eternally bickering sleuths.
Lisa Lutz is the New York Times bestselling author of the Spellman comedic crime novels. Since 2007, the Spellman series has received Edgar, Anthony, and Macavity nominations, and each title has been a selection of the Indie Next List. Lutz lives in San Francisco.
David Hayward is a writer and editor in Northern California. His poetry has won a Pushcart Prize and has appeared in Harper's and other magazines. Hayward has an MFA in poetry from the University of California, Irvine. This is his first novel.
Anonymous
Posted July 7, 2011
This book was a lot of fun. The issue that I had with it, as I read an eBook version, was with the footnotes. In the paper books she writes, half the fun is the footnotes - but in the electronic version, the footnotes were all at the end of the entire book, which made paging back and forth really annoying, and in the end, too much work.
So, the electronic version lost that entire element. If you are a fan of Lisa Lutz, as I am, I would NOT recommend the eBook version!!
6 out of 6 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.I often recommend Lisa Lutz's The Spellmans series to readers who have finished the Stephanie Plum books and are looking for another light hearted fun mystery series.
Heads You Lose is a stand alone book and is a collaboration with David Hayward....who just happens to be Lisa's ex-boyfriend. And it is this connection that makes this book so much fun to read.
So, in the novel, we meet brother and sister Lacey and Paul. They're twenty somethings living in a small town in California. They also grow pot for a living. When a headless corpse appears on their property, chances are it could be work related. But, the ideal thing seems to be to move the body elsewhere to be found given their profession. When the body appears yet again in the front yard, Lacey recognizes it this time as her ex-fiancee. Lacey decides to give the sheriff a hand solving the case...with Paul's help of course.
Lisa writes the first chapter and subsequent odd numbered chapters; David does the even numbered. Emails between the co authors preface each chapter and barbed footnotes abound. The subtle sniping between the two is hilarious. Each chapter takes a new direction as characters are added and killed off. (and brought back!) Clues abound as each author tries to steer the direction the book should take by adding their own twists.
"Another idiotic duck reference was all Lacey had to show for her visit with Marybeth Monroe. It was if some outside element were at work, temporarily putting the brakes on her investigation."
The town is populated by wildly quirky characters, seemingly random clues and red herrings galore - a source of contention between Lisa and David as the outcome is not pre determined.
Heads You Lose was such an entertaining, laugh out loud read. I hope the two authors can put their differences aside and collaborate again. No wait....it works much better for us if they don't get along!
2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.This was a Goodreads first reads give away. I was thrilled when I found out I won this book. The book was a collaboration between two authors. Lisa Lutz would write the first and all odd numbered chapters and David Hayward would write the even numbered chapters. There was to be no discussion or outline, they would read the others chapter then add their own and pass it back and forth until they finished. I thought the premise was unique and held possibilities in an experimental way.
I received the book and read the editor's notes. I was a bit worried when I found out that David was an ex-boyfriend of Lisa's. Before the story gets started and between each chapter, the two authors write notes and critique each other.
After the first 5 or 6 chapters I was loving this book and was sure it was going to get 4 or even 5 stars. The notes between David and Lisa were as interesting as the murder mystery. There were a few passive aggressive things going on, like when Lisa told David he should do some back story for some of the characters, David did just that including a back story for the cat. When Lisa suggested that some of his language was a bit too 'high end' (and she didn't want to Google so many words), David toned down his language throughout his next chapter and in parenthesis added definitions to words that most people would already know. At first this kind of thing was humorous and didn't harm the story.
By the time I got to chapter 10 or so, things were falling apart. It seems to me that the writers let their pettiness and egos get in the way of the story. Instead of building on each others characters and adding to the story they seemed to spend their chapters tearing each others characters down (including killing them off) and trying to repair damage to their characters (including making them just injured and not dead). Towards the end they (the writers) were making comments about who is winning and losing. In my opinion neither one of them won and the story ended up losing. A collaboration and a competition are not the same thing.
As a mystery it had a strong beginning, but the more you read the more erratic it became. It went from solving one murder to solving 9 possibly 10 if you count the 4 possibly 5 people killed years earlier. The characters personalities kept changing with every chapter so by the end of the book you didn't care who did it or who might die next and you wouldn't have been a surprised if the cat (Irving, my favorite character) turned out to be the killer. By chapter 20 or so I had a good guess at who the killer was going to be (and I was right), so according to their notes I knew who did it before the writers. I didn't have all the details figured out until the end (and neither did the writers from what I could tell).
The only thing that kept this book from getting 1 star and staying off my 'burn-pile' shelf was the fact that I actually liked a lot of the writing by both authors. As far as experiments go I can't say this one failed (an experiment is something you do to see the results) but I can say that I didn't like the results of this experiment.
I wouldn't mind seeing this experiment tried again, but by two writers that didn't have so much animosity towards each other.
I would only recommend this book to people who want to know what NOT to do during a collaboration.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Paul and Lacey Hanson are orphaned siblings in their twenties, living together and supporting themselves by growing and selling marijuana. They bicker about anything and everything, but one thing they agree on; because of their illegal activities, they can't call the sheriff when a headless corpse shows up on their property. They move the body to a place they're sure it will be found pretty quickly but won't be connected to them.
When the headless corpse reappears on their front lawn, Lacey and Paul embark on their own investigation, each going off in their own direction. In typical Lutz style, the humor increases as the bodies pile up.
HEADS YOU LOSE is a fun read even if it were just your average quirky mystery, but it's not. The format for the collaboration between former lovers Lutz and Hayward gives this one a whole new spin. Their plan to co-author this book together is for Lutz to write the first and all odd numbered chapters and Hayward to write the even numbered chapters, without the benefit of outlining or discussing the plot. Neither could undo the other's chapter content. After each chapter, they've provided their critiques and responses, evidencing an escalating battle of wills to determine the direction the story will take and which characters will be killed off. Their humorous repartee sent me to Google to see if they've reunited romantically, because they sounded like every married couple on the planet who ever decided to do a lengthy project together, kicking and screaming all the way!
All in all, it's a fun read with a new spin. If you're already of fan of the Spellman series, you won't be disappointed with this light-hearted mystery. Lynn Kimmerle
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.In California, Paul and Lacey Hansen are twentyish brother and sister whose parents are dead. The orphaned siblings grow pot to sell in order to earn some money.
However, their smoke hazed world is shook when they find a headless corpse in their land. The headless body places the siblings at odds with each other; a normal occurrence. The only thing they agree to is they cannot call the cops as they will be busted for growing weed. They relocate the corpse, but a few days later the headless body returns albeit a lot smellier. The pair decides after haggling to investigate who killed the person without a head and why their dump of a property is a dumping ground.
With a nod to the Spellman family chronicles and to Hitchcock's The Trouble with Harry, Lisa Lutz and David Heywood collaborate (in the blind) on a jocular crime caper starring two siblings who humorously battle one another over who should do what. Simply put when it comes to pot or not, readers know what the Hansen duet choose without a flip of the coin. The Spellman crowd and any one who relishes a zany over the top crime thriller will appreciate the insanity of Paul and Lacey, the poster kids for keeping pot illegal.
Harriet Klausner
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted March 10, 2013
Yea na
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted May 14, 2012
I enjoyed this book very much. Unlike some other reviewers, I didn't find the footnotes on the nook difficult to navigate to or from. But the footnotes should definitely not be skipped!
As painful as it may be for the authors, I would love to see another book from them.
JeanW1960
Posted April 25, 2012
Another fun book from Lisa Lutz and great first novel from David Hayward.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Ever wonder how co-writers work to create a book, a mystery book no less. This book is just one example and maybe this isn’t the best way to do it. Each author writes one chapter after reading and critiquing the previous one. This unique book lets us actually see the process as all the author notes are included for our reading pleasure. Maybe choosing an old boyfriend as your co-writer is not a good idea either especially when you can’t agree on anything including major aspects of the story or the characters, let alone who the killer is.
Now the story features Paul and Lacey Hansen, twenty something siblings who find a headless corpse on their property. They can’t chance calling the police because you see, these kids main source of income is the marijuana growing in their basement. The don’t want any cops tripping over their very illegal operation. So of course they just move the dead body to another place and hope it is found quickly with no evidence tracking back to them. Their plans go awry when the body reappears at their curb. Now what??
With these two authors battling each other you just have to read it and find out!
Dollycas’s Thoughts
I can’t believe this story even came together. This tag team writing mirrored tag team wrestling. It was a wild ride. Funny too, with each one trying to show up the other or teach the other a lesson. A character killed in one chapter, then revived in the next. This book was definitely a journey.
As amazing as it sounds a really good mystery was created by this chaos. I really enjoyed it. I didn’t know at times if the heads lost were the just the corpse found or the authors as well. You just have to roll with it and enjoy it for what it is. Mystery/therapy sessions. I am glad I don’t know these authors personally because I would have bash their heads together. How did these two even date?
It is a very clever concept for one story. I definitely wouldn’t want a repeat performance because at times it was a bit distracting but it was a very entertaining read. Need an escape from the heavy suspense thrillers or the romance novels, try the one out, you will not lose your head, just rest on your tail and win an enjoyable time spent between the pages of this good book!
Anonymous
Posted October 7, 2011
I love Lisa Lutz - but as the last reviewer stated, half the fun of her writing is in the footnotes. Until the translators can make the footnotes work on the pages you have in front of you (nook-wise), I would stick to the actual book version for her, and avoid the electronic versions!
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.RisaCup
Posted October 5, 2011
I came across this book while reviewing the new arrivals at my library. I have to agree w/ Book-Hooker, the editors note sold me on the concept of two writers. Their notes made the book better and I found myself wanting to get through each chapter to see what they had to say to each other. Lisa & David have different writing styles & there were times that I was frustrated switching every other chapter. Lisa's chapters were much more entertaining & smoother to read. But I did laugh out loud throughout David's Dick & Jane chapter-CLASSIC! Loved it & look forward to reading more Lisa Lutz.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted August 3, 2011
The book has the potential to be a god one, however the banter between the writers is distracting. They do not write in a similar manner and it makes the book flow choppy. Without the commentary it may have been better. I loved The Spellman Files and hoped the book could compare. Unfortunately it fell short of my expectations.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.3247219
Posted June 14, 2011
I+am+a+huge+Spellman+fan+and+was+looking+forward+to+the+same+level+of+humor+and+writing+expertise+that+enlivens+that+series.++This+book+is+disjointed+and+sophmoric.++I%27+m+not+sure+what+possessed+Lisa+Lutz+to+write+this+with+her+co-author%3F+other+than+extreme+boredom+and+perhaps+a+change+of+pace-+Sorry%2C+Lisa%2C+it+did+not+work.++I+look+forward+to+the+next+Spellman+book+or+something+akin+to+real+writing+versus+an+experiment+in+%22he+said+she+said%22.++We+all+make+mistakes+and+I+am+still+a+loyal+fan+so+please+carry+on.++You+are+clever+and+I+do+appreciate+the+writing+in+your+other+books.
0 out of 3 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Texaslady
Posted June 9, 2011
I am very disappointed with this book. I had to stop reading after 4 or 5 chapters. Do not waste your money.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.an amusing mystery that's a quick read. however, I hated the writers comments to each other at the end of every chapter -- it ruined it for me. so just to get through the story, I skipped all the comments after each chapter. the intro was fine, but don't they realize how much the comments distract from the story?
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted May 22, 2011
Lutz became my favorite author as soon as I started reading the Spellman Files series. I was very excited when I heard she had a new book out. Maybe I built the book up in my head because I'm such a fan...but I could not get into this book. There were a few moments where I laughed and saw the old Lutz writing that I fell in love with, but overall I was disappointed. I really hope she writes alone next time.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Book-Hooker
Posted May 17, 2011
Must read if you're a Lutz fan! Literally you will laugh out loud. The fact the the editor left the correspondence is genius. The notes really made the book that much better. I hope they collaborate again!
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Tenna
Posted April 24, 2011
I posted a thorough review on my blog, but apparently, the rules say you can't include a url. The premise is as others have said, so I won't bore you with a repeat.
I heard about this book on NPR, and the premise sounded interesting, so I downloaded to my Nook.
A "couldn't put it down" read, and the authors still dying "historical relationship" with it's jabs and left crosses in between chapters added to the intrigue. The title was a superior choice.
These two should write together more. I'd read everything they could put in my Nook!
BookHounds
Posted April 23, 2011
Lisa Lutz and her ex, David Hayward collaborate on probably one of the quirkiest books I have ever read, but it is quirky in a good way. They alternate writing chapters which are interspersed with their emails discussing the plot and past personal history. Yes, it sounds weird, but it works. It is full of snark, snippy remarks and colorful language and those are just the notes between the authors. The story itself, actually has less violence.
Paul and Lacey are orphaned when their parents die in a freak carbon dioxide accident and Paul develops a business selling marijuana to the locals in a sort of Weeds take off. There is a body left on their property with no head and when Paul and Lacey move the body, it turns back up on their doorstep. This sets off the plot in true Lisa Lutz fashion and wackiness ensues. There are several more murders, deaths and accidents that Lacey sets out to solve in true PI fashion. Paul discovers some unsavory facts about their small town as well. There is a bit of romance between Lacey and the new town doctor and Paul finds his match in a gimpy, genius, ex-exotic dancer. Of course, the two co authors wrap up the plot in a nice tidy package. If you like Lisa's Spellman Files, you won't be disappointed with this one.
Anonymous
Posted June 11, 2012
No text was provided for this review.
Overview
New York Times-bestselling author Lisa Lutz conspires with-or should we say against?- coauthor David Hayward to write an original and hilarious tag-team crime novel.
Meet Paul and Lacey Hansen: orphaned, pot-growing twentysomething siblings eking out a living in rural Northern California. When a headless corpse appears on their property, they can't exactly dial 911, so they move the body and wait for the police to find it. Instead, the corpse ...