Book 158: Botswana (English) – The No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency (Alexander MCCALL SMITH)

Mma Ramotswe had a detective agency in Africa, at the foot of Kgale Hill. These were its assets: a tiny white van, two desks, two chairs, a telephone, and an old typewriter. Then there was a teapot, in which Mma Ramotswe – the only lady private detective in Botswana – brewed redbush tea. And three mugs – one for herself, one for her secretary, and one for the client. What else does a detective agency really need? Detective agencies rely on human intuition and intelligence, both of which Mma Ramotswe had in abundance. No inventory would ever include those, of course.

From Namibia let’s hop next door to Botswana. This is another old best-seller that it took me a very long time to get around to (there are many books in the series now)! Alexander McCall Smith has written a whole slew of popular mystery novels, some with wonderful titles (my favourite is probably Morality for Beautiful Girls) set in Botswana (and other places), of which this is the first. They feature Precious Ramotswe, Botswana’s first – and only – female private detective (like Laos’ first and only coroner/detective in The Coroner’s Lunch). She is a sort of African Miss Marple, but the stories reminded me of many of the sorts of cases Sherlock Holmes worked on – not necessarily (or usually) murders, or even of great moment, but intriguing and solved with a mixture of common sense, knowledge of human nature and intuition.

Alexander McCall Smith was born in Zimbabwe, has lived in Botswana and now lives in Scotland. He obviously loves Botswana and the Batswana people. I would love to hear from any Batswana to whether you agree, but I felt that McCall Smith did an amazing job of creating and understanding his black African woman protagonist.

Although it is a connected narrative, the chapters and cases make it come across as almost a collection of short stories. The style is light and not literary – it is very easy to read – and yet it is very well-written, wise and funny (especially the incident of the snake she thinks she’s run over). In a word, delightful.

McCall Smith, Alexander, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, London, Abacus, 2003 (first published 1998), ISBN 0 349 11675 X

Book 24: Great Britain: Scotland (English) – Kidnapped (Robert Louis STEVENSON)

“We were going down a heathery brae, Alan leading and I following a pace or two behind, like a fiddler and his wife; when upon a sudden the heather gave a rustle, three or four ragged men leaped out, and the next moment we were lying on our backs, each with a dirk at his throat.

                I don’t think I cared; the pain of this rough handling was quite swallowed up by the pains of which I was I was already full; and I was too glad to have stopped walking to mind about a dirk. i lay looking up in the face of the man that held me; and I mind his face was black with the sun and his eyes very light, but I was not afraid of him. I heard Alan and another whispering in the Gaelic; and what they said was all one to me.”

 

Another classic that everyone else has probably read… I fell in love with RLS the man as a 21-year-old when I visited his moving hilltop grave “under the wide and starry sky” in what was then Western Samoa, but somehow missed this rollicking adventure story, so I seized the excuse to read it now. It is soaked in the atmosphere of heavy inter-clan rivalry and injustices suffered from the English. Stevenson is up there with luminaries like Dickens for creating some of the most memorable characters ever. Through the narrator, David (Davie), we follow a boy who is swept out of his comfort zone but revels in the thrilling adventures life throws at him. Some of the Scottish words were unfamiliar to me but it was often possible to guess their meaning and nothing holds up the impetus of the narrative. If, like me, you missed this wonderful book in your childhood, don’t dismiss it as a ‘mere’ children’s book, you will still love it!

 

STEVENSON, Robert Louis (1850 – 1894), Kidnapped, London: Vintage, 2009 (originally 1886), ISBN 978-0-099-51896-9