The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency (book series)

The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency (1998)
Tear of the Giraffe (2000)
Morality for Beautiful Girls (2001)
The Kalahari Typing School for Men (2002)

By Alexander McCall Smith (Abacus / Time Warner Book Group)

Precious Ramotswe is an original through and through. Given an inheritance by her late father, Ramotswe becomes Botswana's first and only female private detective setting up a business that attracts requests to trap unfaithful husbands, find missing children and generally know everything there is to know in Botswana, it seems. Woven into the cases are observations about Botswana and these insights into the African mentality, pitting the good old days against some of the ills of the modern world, are the true gems of McCall Smith's creation.

The main cast of characters, Ramotswe, her fiance Mr JLB Matekoni and her assistant Mma Makutsi, all exude a particular warmth in their mannerisms that endear them to the reader. The books are not so much about solving crimes but understanding people, which is why it's hard to define the series as 'detective fiction'.

The strength is surely McCall Smith's own experience of Africa, deftly concealed in Ramotswe's views of her country, and his ability to conceal and reveal details of each case without insulting the intelligence of his readership (are you reading this, Dan Brown?). Often I knew what was coming, the solution to some of the cases, and I'd anticipate it, but instead of the conclusion becoming a disappointing confirmation of my knowledge, I enjoyed the interaction of the characters and the added bonus of their perspective thrown in.

The writing can best be described as quaint, though this hardly takes into account the engaging pace of the four books, which I devoured in eight train trips. Definitely worth a read of you can get your hands on a copy.

**** - I never seriously thought about going to Africa until I read this series