Alexander McCall Smith is the author of the huge international phenomenon, The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, and The Sunday Philosophy Club series. He is a professor of medical law at Edinburgh University. He was born in what is now known as Zimbabwe and he was a law professor at the University of Botswana. He lives in Scotland.

"McCall Smith's assessments of fellow humans are piercing and profound. . . . [His] depictions of Edinburgh are vivid and seamless." --San Francisco Chronicle "[McCall Smith's] accomplished novels . . . [are] dependent on small gestures redolent with meaning and main characters blessed with pleasing personalities. . . . .These novels are gentle probes into the mysteries of human nature." --Newsday "McCall Smith's writing . . . harks back to a more tranquil age, where gentle ironies and strict proprieties prevail. . . . The pleasure of the novel lies in its simplicity." --The Independent (London)"Utterly enchanting . . . It is impossible to come away from an Alexander McCall Smith 'mystery' novel without a smile on the lips and warm fuzzies in the heart." --Chicago Sun-Times "McCall Smith's assessments of fellow humans are piercing and profound. . . . [His] depictions of Edinburgh are vivid and seamless." --San Francisco Chronicle"McCall Smith's generous writing and dry humor, his gentleness and humanity, and his ability to evoke a place and a set of characters without caricature or condescension have endeared his books . . . to readers." --The New York Times"Pure joy. . . . The voice, the setting, the stories, the mysteries of human nature. . . . [McCall Smith's] writing is accessible and the prose is beautiful." --Amy Tan
"[McCall Smith's] accomplished novels . . . [are] dependent on small gestures redolent with meaning and main characters blessed with pleasing personalities . . . Not so much conventional mysteries, [his] novels are gentle probes into the mysteries of human nature." --Newsday"Mr. Smith, a fine writer, paints his hometown of Edinburgh as indelibly as he captures the sunniness of Africa. We can almost feel the mists as we tread the cobblestones." --The Dallas Morning News"Alexander McCall Smith has become one of those commodities, like oil or chocolate or money, where the supply is never sufficient to the demand. . . . [He] is prolific and habit-forming." --The Globe and Mail (Toronto)"[McCall Smith] captures the cold, foggy, history-drenched atmosphere of Edinburgh . . . with a Jane Austen-like attention to detail." --USA Today

Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

Pub date: 2005-06-14

Length: 352 pages