Alexander McCall Smith, página 3 de 11

Amateur sleuth Isabel Dalhousie is a philosopher who also uses her training to solve unusual mysteries. Isabel is Editor of the Review of Applied Ethics - which addresses such questions as 'Truth telling in sexual relationships' - and she also hosts The Sunday Philosophy Club at her house in Edinburgh. Behind the city's Georgian facades its moral compasses are spinning with greed, dishonesty and murderous intent. Instinct tells Isabel that the young man who tumbled to his death in front of her eyes at a concert in the Usher Hall didn't fall. He was pushed. With Isabel Dalhousie Alexander McCall Smith introduces a new and pneumatic female sleuth to tackle murder, mayhem - and the mysteries of life. As her hero WH Auden maintained, classic detective fiction stems from a desire for an uncorrupted Eden which the detective, as an agent of God, can return to us. But then Isabel, being a philosopher, has a thing or two to say about God as well.

Isabel Dalhousie thinks often of friends, sometimes of lovers, and on occasion of chocolate. As an Edinburgh philosopher she is certain of where she stands. She can review a book called In Praise of Sin with panache and conviction, but real life is...well, perhaps a bit more challenging - particularly when it comes to her feelings for Jamie, a younger man who should have married her niece, Cat. Jamie's handsomeness leaves Isabel feeling distinctly uneasy, and ethically disturbed. 'I am a philosopher', she thinks, 'but I am also a woman'. And more disturbance is in store. When Cat takes a break in Italy, Isabel agrees to run her delicatessen. One of the customers, she discovers, has recently had a heart transplant and is now being plagued by memories that cannot be rationally explained and which he feels do not belong to him. Isabel is intrigued. So intrigued that she finds herself rushing headlong into a dangerous investigation. But she still has time to think about the things that possess her - things like love and friendship, and, of course, temptation. The last of these comes in many forms - chocolate, for example, or seductive Italians...

Mma Ramotswe is not one to sit about. Her busy life gives her little time for relaxation (apart from the drinking of tea, of course, which is another matter altogether). Nonetheless, she is persuaded to take a holiday from the No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency. But Mma Ramotswe finds it impossible to resist the temptation to follow the cases taken on by her business partner, Mma Makutsi, and to interfere in them - at one remove. This leads her to delve into the past of a man whose reputation has been called into question. Meanwhile, Violet Sephotho, Mma Makutsi's arch enemy, has had the temerity to set up a new secretarial college - one that aims to rival that great institution, the Botswana Secretarial College. Will she get her comeuppance? It will be a close-run thing.

Isabel Dalhousie is one of Edinburgh's most generous (but discreet) philanthropists - but should she be more charitable? She wonders, sometimes, if she is too judgmental about her niece's amorous exploits, too sharp about her housekeeper's spiritual beliefs, too ready to bristle in battle against her enemies. As the editor of the Review of Applied Ethics, she doesn't, of course, allow herself actual enemies, but she does feel enmity - especially towards two academics who have just arrived in the city. Isabel feels they're a highly destabilizing influence; little tremors in the volcanic rock upon which an Enlightened Edinburgh perches. Equally troubling is the situation of the little boy who is convinced he had a previous life. When Isabel is called upon to help, she finds herself questioning her views on reincarnation. And the nature of grief. And - crucially - the positioning of lighthouses. The only questions Isabel doesn't have to address concern her personal life. With her young son and devoted husband her home life is blissfully content. Which is the best possible launching pad for the next issue of the Review - the Happiness issue. As Isabel is beginning to appreciate, happiness, for most people, is not quite what it seems ...

Precious and Grace is a story about life at Botswana's leading No. 1 Ladies' detective agency.One bright morning, Precious Ramotswe - head of Botswana's No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency - receives a visitor: a woman from Australia. This woman asks Precious to take on a case: to find the nursemaid who raised her during her childhood in Botswana. The woman wants to thank her for being such an important part of her life. Precious has a history of successfully solving cases, but this one proves difficult and throws up a number of surprises and challenges.Back in her office, next door to the Speedy Motors Garage on Twokleng Road, Precious also has a team to manage: Mr Polopetsi, a part-time science teacher and new assistant at the agency; she mentors Charlie, a former apprentice and young man too handsome and charming for his own good - a man who has gotten himself in deep water; and then there is Precious's tumultuous but heart-warming friendship with her co-director, the fiery Grace Makutsi.Precious and Grace is a story about being a detective, the complexities of human nature, as well as lessons about gratitude and obligation.

Una vez más, nos ponemos al día con los tejemanejes de deliciosas en la ficticia Calle 44 Escocia a partir de Alexander McCall Smith. Con encanto y destreza habitual, Alexander McCall Smith nos da una nueva entrega de esta popular serie, actualmente en ejecución en The Scotsman. Cualquier cosa puede pasar a Bertie y la pandilla, sobre todo con una invitación a uno de los principales festivales de jazz de Escocia -

The thirteenth novel in the wonderful No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, from master storyteller Alexander McCall Smith.

First published in 1989 as Children of Wax, The Girl Who Married a Lion includes all but one of the original stories and features six new folk tales, an introduction by Alexander McCall Smith and a letter from the one and only Mma Ramotswe. From animal fables to mysterious forces residing in the landscape, this collection demonstrates the wealth and variety of African folk tales and the particular magic of Africa's spiritual roots: a sense of unity with the environment. Simple, surprising, cruel and humorous, these beautifully rendered tales remain as fresh and vital as in the original African idiom.

Author Alexander McCall Smith became a worldwide sensation with his No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency novels. His award-winning wit is fully on display in this charming work. Here, in delightfully authentic sketches, are all the archetypes of Edinburgh society. There is the surveyor who dreams of a membership in Muirfield golf club. There is the pushy Stockbridge mother. There is the intellectual lady who sees herself as part of a much larger world. These characters and more confront issues of trust, love, and loss.

In this fourth volume of the No. 1 Ladies´ Detective Agency series, the ever-pipular Precious Ramotswe - Botswana´s leading, and only. Female private detective - faces a new and unwanted problem: competition. "Ex-CID. Ex-New York. Ex-cellent" reads the sign outside the Satisfaction Guaranteed Detective Agency. Cephas Buthelezi certainly talks the talk, Precious discovers, but would he have the wherewithal to deal with her current case - a man who has been attacked by ostrich rustlers, and is eager to reassess his life?

Starred Review. Like Smith's bestselling Botswana mysteries, this book—comprising 110 sections, originally serialized in the Scotsman, that drolly chronicle the lives of residents in an Edinburgh boarding house—is episodic, amusing and peopled with characters both endearing and benignly problematic. Pat, 21, is on her second "gap year" (her first yearlong break from her studies was such a flop she refuses to discuss it), employed at a minor art gallery and newly settled at the eponymous address, where she admires vain flatmate Bruce and befriends neighbor Domenica. A low-level mystery develops about a possibly valuable painting that Pat discovers, proceeds to lose and then finds in the unlikely possession of Ian Rankin, whose bestselling mysteries celebrate the dark side of Edinburgh just as Smith's explore the (mostly) sunny side. The possibility of romance, the ongoing ups and downs of the large, well-drawn cast of characters, the intricate plot and the way Smith nimbly jumps from situation to situation and POV to POV—he was charged, after all, with keeping his newspaper readers both momentarily satisfied and eager for the next installment—works beautifully in book form. No doubt Smith's fans will clamor for more about 44 Scotland Street, and given the author's celebrated productivity, he'll probably give them what they want. Agent, Robin Straus. (June)

Ressortissant britannique né en 1948 au Zimbabwe, où il a grandi, Alexander McCall Smith vit aujourd'hui à Édimbourg et exerce les fonctions de professeur de droit appliqué à la médecine. Il est internationalement connu pour avoir créé le personnage de la première femme détective du Botswana, Mma Precious Ramotswe, héroïne d'une série qui compte déjà huit volumes. Quand il n'écrit pas, Alexander McCall Smith s'adonne à la musique - il fait partie de « l'Orchestre épouvantable » - et aux voyages. Il est également l'auteur des aventures d'Isabel Dalhousie, présidente du Club des philosophes amateurs et de 44 Scotland Street, qui inaugure les « Chroniques d' Édimbourg », un roman-feuilleton relatant les tribulations d'un immeuble peuplé de personnages hauts en couleur.

Precious Ramotswe is a kind, warm-hearted and large African lady. She is also the only female private detective in Botswana. Her agency - The No. 1 LadiesDetective Agency - is the best in the country. With the help of her secretary, Mma Makutsi, and her best friend, Mr JLB Matekoni, she solves a number of difficult - and sometimes dangerous - problems. A missing husband, a missing finger and a missing child - she will solve these mysteries in her own special way. Book + CD.

Alexander McCall Smith's many fans will be pleased with this latest installment in the bestselling 44 Scotland Street series. Back are all our favorite denizens of a Georgian townhouse in Edinburgh. Bertie the immensely talented six year old is now enrolled in kindergarten, and much to his dismay, has been clad in pink overalls for his first day of class. Bruce has lost his job as a surveyor, and between admiring glances in the mirror, is contemplating becoming a wine merchant. Pat is embarking on a new life at Edinburgh University and perhaps on a new relationship, courtesy of Domenica, her witty and worldly-wise neighbor. McCall Smith has much in store for them as the brief spell of glorious summer sunshine gives way to fall a season cursed with more traditionally Scottish weather. Full of McCall Smith's gentle humor and sympathy for his characters, Espresso Tales is also an affectionate portrait of a city and its people who, in the author's own words, "make it one of the most vibrant and interesting places in the world."