Review:- Alexander McCall Smith – “The Double Comfort Safari Club”

Year Published: - 2010
Where the book was from:- Pensby Library
ISBN: - 978 1 4087 0105
Pages: - 248pp
Genre: - Cosy / General Fiction
Location:- Botswana
How I came across it: - New books shelf
Rating: - ***** *****
One sentence summary:- In the latest installment from the No 1 Ladies Detective Agency Mma Ramotswe searches for the beneficiary of a woman’s legacy and the fiancé of her assistant, Mma Makutsi, meets with a serious mishap. During the course of their investigations they visit a safari park in the Okavango Delta.

Describe the plot without giving anything away:- For those who don’t know the background to the No 1 Ladies Detective Agency series they are set in Botswana and Mma Ramotswe, a traditionally-built lady, is a philosophizing detective married to a typically hard-working and kind motor mechanic, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. McCall Smith’s love of Botswana, its history and its people is apparent on every page.

General comments:- This is the eleventh book in the series. According to my blog I’ve missed the tenth ‘Tea Time for the Traditionally Built’ so I must hunt it out soon.

Quotations:
“All these facts were indeed both incontestable and well known; whereas Mma Ramotswe’s pronouncements, to which she attributed the special status of being well known, were often, rather, statements of opinion. There was a difference, thought Mr J.L.B. Maketoni, but it was not one he was planning to point out; there were some things, after all, that it was not helpful for a husband to say to his wife and that, he thought, was probably one of them.”

“That was the way the world was; it was composed of a few almost perfect people (ourselves); then there were a good many people who generally did their best but were not all that perfect (our friends and colleagues); and finally, there were a few rather nasty ones (our enemies and opponents). Most people fell into that middle group – those who did their best – and the last group was, thankfully, very small. and not ,much in evidence in places like Botswana, where he was fortunate enough to live.”

AUTHOR Notes:- Alexander McCall Smith – see The Right Attitude to Rain

Review – Alexander McCall SMITH – “The Comfort of Saturdays”

Publ: 2008 Little, Brown
Pensby Library
ISBN: 978 1 4087 0065 5
Genre: General Fiction; Philosophy, Mystery
Pages: 234p
Continuation of reading this series
Rating: ***** ****


(Appears to have also been published with the title “The Comfort of a Muddy Saturday”)



What led you to pick up this book?
I have read and enjoyed the previous five Isabel Dalhousie novels of McCall Smith.

Describe the plot without giving anything away.
Isabel, the owner and editor of a journal of philosophy, has a small child and a new challenge when she hears at a dinner party of a disgraced doctor who appears to be innocent of the allegations which have ruined his career. Despite the advice of her younger partner, Jamie, she responds to the challenge of proving him innocent.

What did you think of the characters?
I delight in Isabel’s thought processes and her ethical battles with herself. Many of the rest of the Edinburgh crowd are re-introduced to good effect.

What did you think about the style?
I think there was a danger of McCall Smith going OTT in showing off his expertise as the series progressed but this book is back to providing a good balance between story line and philosophy.

What did you like most about the book?
The element of familiarity is always a selling point when one is well into a series. The reader is saved much of the hassle of imagining the characters as they are already firmly established as ‘real’ people without the need to be introduced.

Was there anything you didn't like about the book?
No.

Thoughts on the book jacket / cover.
I like it when a series has a matching style of book jacket and whilst these are not inspiring they do match.

Would I recommend it?
Yes.

Quotations:

Without shame, guilt became a toothless thing, a prosecutor with no penalties up his sleeve.

...had there not been a Victorian librarian who had insisted on keeping books by men and women on separate shelves – unless, of course, the authors were married, in which case the books might properly be placed side by side.

Letters with moral merit are often very dull, Humour, Charlie, usually needs a victim.

Isabel shot a glance at her niece. It seemed inconceivable to her, not to be intrigued by the world. But Cat really was not. She related only to those things that impinged upon her immediate life.

ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH see The Right Attitude to Rain.

Alexander McCall Smith - "The Miracle at Speedy Motors"

Publ: 2008 ISBN: 978031603007
Rating: ****


This is the ninth book in the infinitely enjoyable and best-selling No 1 Ladies Detective agency series. Mma Ramotswe continues to do what she does best - solve mysteries and philosophise about life in Botswana. Meanwhile Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni does more than just run Speedy Motors. All good clean fun.

“Mma Ramotswe had never been able to understand that, and considered it one of the very worst features of modern society that people should be ashamed to be of traditional build, cultivating instead a look that was bony and positively uncomfortable. Everybody knows, she thought, that we have skeleton underneath our skin; there’s no reason to show it.”

“’Would it nor be better if a man did not have to pay for his wife?’ she asked Mr. J.L.B. Maketoni. ‘I am not one to disturb old customs unnecessarily, but wouldn’t it be better?’
“Rather to her surprise, Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni was quick to agree. ‘Yes,. It would be better. You pay for a car, you do not pay for a wife.’
Mma Ramotswe looked at him with admiration. ‘That is a very modern view, Mr J.L.B.Maketoni,’ she said, almost adding ‘for a man,’ but not doing so. Men could be modern too, she reminded herself.”

“‘I think I know the answer to your problem, Rra,’ she would say. ‘It is in your bed. That is where the answer lies’.
Such advice would not be well received, and could well be misinterpreted. The client might take it as a disparaging reflection to a wife or husband, for example, and it could be awkward explaining that the solution lay in the mattress rather than in any person upon the mattress. Mind you, that was often the case too, she suspected, but she could not say that either.”

ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH - See The Right Attitude to Rain

Alexander McCall Smith - "The Careful Use of Compliments"

 

Isabel Dalhousie is back in her fourth book, published in 2007, the latest installment of this enchanting, already beloved, best-selling series.

In addition to being the nosiest and most sypathetic philosopher you are likely to meet, Isabel is now a mother. Charlies, her newborn son, presents her with a myriad wonders of a new life, and doting father Jamie presents her with an intriguing proposal: marriage. In the midst of all this, she receives a disturbing letter announcing that she has been ousted as editor of the Review of Applied Ethics by the ambitious Professor Dove.

None of these things, however, in any way diminshes Isabel's curiosity. And when she attends an art auction, she finds an irresistable puzzle: two paintings attributed to a now-deceased artist appear on the market at the same time, and both of them exhibit some unusual characteristics. Are these paintings forgeries? This proves to be sufficient fodder for Isabel's inquisitiveness. So she begins an investigation... and soon finds herself diverging from her philosophical musings about fatherhood onto a path that leads her into the mysteries of the art world and the soul of an artist.

For some earlier Alexander McCall Smith entries see -
http://bookeverysixdays.blogspot.com/2008/01/alexander-mccall-smith-right-attitude.html

A couple of quotes:-

"She looked at the room around her, at her desk, at her books. None of this would belong to her for ever; it would change hands and somebody new would be here, somebody who would not even know who she had been, somebody who would look at her with astonishment if she came back, in some thought experiment, and said: That’s my desk – I want it. Our possessing of our world is a temporary matter: we stamp our ownership upon our surroundings, give familiar names to the land about us, erect statues of ourselves, but all of this is swept away, so quickly, so easily. We think the world is ours for ever, but we are little more than squatters."

"There were two horses in the soul. she thought, as Socrates had said, in the Phaedrus – the one, unruly, governed by passions, pulling in the direction of self-indulgence; the other, restrained, dutiful, governed by a sense of shame.... "

"They stood at the front door; Peter pressed the small white button in the middle of a brass fitting to the right: PLEASE PUSH was written on the porcelain; olds Edinburgh – modern buttons just said PUSH, the simple imperative, not the polite cousin."

Alexander McCall Smith – “Espresso Tales”

 

When I began to read “Espresso Tales” I had a definite feeling of deja vu. By the time I reached the end I concluded that I must at some stage have started this book but not completed it. Espresso Tales is the second in the 44 Scotland Street series and a worthy runner up to that work.

For previous McCall Smith readings see -
http://bookeverysixdays.blogspot.com/2008/01/alexander-mccall-smith-right-attitude.html