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More from the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency
by Alexander McCall Smith
Book Reviewed by:Comment: McCall Smith is back with another totally
soft-boiled mystery set in Botswana. In this episode Precious
Ramotswe, of the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency, is on the case again,
this time assisting the self-made founder of a chain of hairdressing
salons who wants to unearth the real intentions of her four suitors,
each possibly more interested in her money than her heart.
The chances are you're already familiar with
this series, but if you're not, I do encourage you to give it a try;
as Bill Ott, writing for Booklist says, 'The tremendous appeal of
this delightful series comes from the unique manner in which Smith
mixes the charm of both traditional and contemporary village cozies
(from Miss Marple to the Maggody novels) with a comical Runyonesque
formality of language and a grasp of human relations that is very
like Jane Austen (Mma Ramotswe, in fact, has a lot of Emma in
her)'.
The first book in the series - 'The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency' was
published in the UK in 1998 but didn't arrive in the USA until 2001,
and unfortunately we're still lagging behind; this is the fifth in
the series. The 6th has already been released in the UK but
won't be released in the USA until April this year (see sidebar).
This review
first ran in the February 2, 2005
issue of BookBrowse Recommends.
If you liked The Full Cupboard of Life, try these:
by Jacqueline Winspear
Published 2006
In the third novel of this bestselling series, London investigator Maisie Dobbs faces grave danger as she returns to the site of her most painful WWI memories to resolve the mystery of a pilot's death
by Priscilla Royal
Published 2006
'With its intriguing plot, chilling conclusion and characters who exhibit universal and timeless feelings, this fresh first has all the potential to evolve into a series as enduring as Ellis Peters's Brother Cadfael books.'
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