Ladies no 1 detective agency full#
Ladies no 1 detective agency series#

In the Company of Cheerful Ladies (2005) | Buy this book | Kindle it!.The Kalahari Typing School for Men (2003) | Buy this book | Kindle it!.Morality for Beautiful Girls (2001) | Buy this book | Kindle it!.Tears of the Giraffe (2000) | Buy this book | Kindle it!.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency (1998) | Buy this book | Kindle it! James, Talking About Detective Fiction (2009) “Mma Ramotswe’s heart is as ample as her frame, and although the most atrrocious murders are unlikely to come her way, any injustice, large or small, engages her energies and compassion.”.Precious Ramotswe is a remarkable creation”

Ladies no 1 detective agency full#

“Smith’s gently ironic tone is full of good humor towards his lively, intelligent heroine and towards her fellow Africans, who live their lives with dignity and with cautious acceptance of the confusions to which the world submits them.

I haven’t read anything with such unalloyed pleasure for a long time.” His descriptions leave one as if standing in the Botswanan landscape.

“The author’s prose has the merits of simplicity, euphony and precision.

He has become more of a movement, a worldwide club for the dissemination of gentle wisdom and good cheer.”

“To say McCall Smith is a literary phenomenon doesn’t quite describe what has happened.

He lives in Scotland, where in his spare time he plays a really mean bassoon. In 2004 he was awarded British Book Awards Author of the Year and Booksellers Association Author of the Year.

He has written more than fifty books, including several works of non-fiction, as well as the popular Sunday Philosophy Club mysteries, but he’s best known for the No. ABOUT THE AUTHORĪlexander McCall Smith was born in what is now Zimbabwe, taught law at the University of Botswana and is now Professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh. Matekoni, the lovestruck mechanic and proprietor of the local Speedy Motors, Precious’ would-be suitor and eventual husband, who keeps her old clunker from falling apart. Besides Mma Ramotswe, there’s her bookish, tightly wound secretary, Mma Grace Makutsi, and Mr. And that’s meant entirely as a compliment.Ĭlever, patient and displaying tremendous gumption, Precious is a young “traditionally built” woman who serves as the novels’ main character and narrator, but the episodic tone of the novels revolves as much around the adventures and foibles of different colourful characters as irt does around the mysteries.

Ladies no 1 detective agency series#

In fact, the precedent for this series may be not some hard-boiled - or even softly cozy - mystery series, but James Herriot’s All Thing Bright and Beautiful series of novels. Unlike many female eyes, Precious isn’t particularly well-educated, nor is she prone to soul-searching or jogging.īut that’s not to say she’s not smart - in fact, she’s blessed with a shrewd empathy and the sort of true grit and clear-eyed pragmatism that readers of more hard-boiled fare will instantly recognize, even if the oft-covered themes of domestic violence, understanding, compassion, forgiveness, restitution and domestic infidelity, and her genteel, folksy, homespun common sense approach to problem solving (often over a steaming cup of red bush tea) set her apart from the herd. Nor does she have much in common with her fellow sisters in the gumshoe game.

The series is a global phenomenom, each new title rocketing up the bestselling charts, and spawning an entire industry unto itself that includes a BBC radio series, a popular HBO television adaptation starring American singer Jill Scott, a cookbook and now evidently a series of books aimed at young readers.Īlthough the self-taught sleuth is certainly a private detective, the books are a far cry from the mean streets of Chandler, Mosley, Hammett et al. Although there’s something downright cozy about the whole thing, what with its quirky, engaging cast and its on-going emphasis on their assorted domestic, romantic and emotional crises, it never devolves into frothy sap or cloying cuteness, and even a crank like me can find no other word for this series but “charming.”Īnd millions of fans seem to agree with me. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency in Gaborone, Botswana, thus becoming that emerging south African nation’s first female detective. One of the most unlikely but likable of private eyes, PRECIOUS RAMOTSWE is a fat, jolly young (she’s only 22 in the first novel) woman who sets up The No.