Customer Reviews

The Double Comfort Safari Club: The New No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency Novel (The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency)

5 star:		(63)
4 star:		(25)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I have really enjoyed this series - now up to number 11 I think with this installment. It is unique in many ways and teaches many lessons about life. By the way, the TV series is great too.

Besides the more obvious things like the great characters in the series - after a while they seem like you actually know them as you would real people - what I really liked about the series is the details about Botswana and life there. And so much of it is positive, unlike so much of what you hear about Africa these days. The books also teach many lessons useful to people everywhere, but from a Botswana/African perspective that can really shine a light where it needs to shine so to speak.

The first book was especially good in portraying the Botswana background and viewpoint - I assume accuracy here as the author lived there a long time. The author seemed to move away from this as the series progressed - maybe he thought readers had enough or knew all of it already and did not want to hear about it so much. I disagree. It's what got me hooked on the series.

Like many others, I was somewhat disappointed with the book right before this one - the 10th I think, Tea Time for the Traditionally Built. It just wasn't as good as the ones before it. I was worried that the series had run out of steam.

I am happy to see that this new installment gets back to the series roots in many respects showing us some more about the real Botswana, especially something we have not yet seen in the series - the delta region. The overall plot seems very vigorous too - an improvement over #10 I think. I won't go into that too much as readers usually like a surprise.

I hope that series fans will come back and read this latest book, meet favorite characters again, be entertained, and learn something about Botswana and life in general as well.

In fact No.11 is as good as No.1 and Nos.2-10 as well: I never thought that the novels went off. It is a remarkable literary achievement, to write eleven magnificent and thoroughly enjoyable novels, with our favorite characters getting even more lovable as time goes by, and without the quality tapering off in any way.

So eleven cheers for Alexander McCall Smith not just on this novel as a stand-alone work - which is great in itself - but in this unique literary achievement of a series of eleven novels all of which are as good as each other. Not even JRR Tolkein managed it (with Lord of the Rings at just three volumes), and Dickens novels were all about separate characters. No, this is a truly remarkable feat...

AND even more so if one considers that our favorite novelist is writing other series as well - including the two new novels set in London (out soon in the USA), which are equally good and, sadly it seems, not as well known or appreciated by McCall Smith aficianados as perhaps they should be, since they are every bit as good, not to mention hilariously funny, as the better known African eleven volume series.

So read and enjoy this novel, and then dip into his other series as well, in Edinburgh (two series), London (one) and Germany (one series).

Christopher Catherwood

This is the 11th installment in Alexander McCall Smith's enchanting and uplifting series about a female detective living in Botswana. It is not necessary to have read ALL the other books in the series, but if you haven't read any, this is probably not the best place to start.

The structure is very similar to others in the series, with the familiar cast of characters appearing. There are essentially four interwoven storylines. Mma Makutsi's fiance Mr Phuti Radiphuti is in an accident and she clashes with his aunt over who should nurse him back to health. Meanwhile, Mma Ramotswe has several cases on the go. She is asked to investigate whether a husband is being unfaithful, to assist another man who has been swindled out of his money and travels with Mma Makutsi to the Okavango Delta to track down a safari guide who has been left some money in a will. However these storylines often take a backseat to discussions about teapots, new boots and the merits of the new blue van.

The book opens with Mr J L B Matekoni musing about road rage and the futility of reacting to it and it ends with Mma Ramotswe musing about how to lead a good life. "Do not complain about your life. Do not blame others for things that you have brought upon yourself. Be content with who you are and where you are, and do whatever you can to bring to others such contentment, and joy, and understanding that you have managed to find yourself."

It's a lovely, warm and fuzzy novel that lives up in every way to the others in this gorgeous series.

I prize the First Ladies Detective Agency series for its sense of Africa and its twinkly affection for the human condition. The mystery strands are uneven in terms of depth and predictability, but even a weak storyline is usually buoyed by the pageant of Africa through McCall Smith's Botswana and its people. Especially, he has excelled at portraying the delicate balancing act of reconciling traditional culture and values with the high speed of modern life.

The Double Comfort Safari Club is an opportunity to return to the company of the protagonist, Mma Precious Ramotswe, and her friends and fellow citizens of Botswana, but I would not recommend it as the place to start in the series. It might not convince a newcomer of the series' strengths, such as the full impact of the 21st century world on traditional Africa. The puzzles are not really puzzles so much as waiting to see just how the lady detectives wrap up their cases. The solutions are more comic guile than anything else.

So, read this if you like the series; read the other volumes first if you haven't fallen for the author's charms as yet.

Precious Ramotswe's crime solving in Botswana ably assisted by her trusty side-kick, Mma Makutsi is chronicled in another gently humourous offering from Alexander McCall Smith. the Double Comfort Safari Club has some mystery, some minor tragedy and Smith manages to invest a little cunning legal tickery in here as well.

Precious Ramotswe is on the case of a mystery guide who has been left a large legacy by a grateful American tourist who remembers their kindness. The only trouble the now 'late' tourist can not remember the name, or the name of the company they worked for. Precious and Mma Makutsi must travel to the area to discover this man. The journey is full of the small observations in life - who they will stay with, and most importantly (for Mma Makutsi) what shoes they must wear. McCall smith is at his most humourous best in these discussions. Mma Makutsi's helpful instructions while driving are just delicious.

Meanwhile tragedy has struck Mma Makutsi. Her fiance Phuti Radiphuti of the Double Comfort Furniture shop has been struck by a truck and is now in hospital having an amputation. Unfortunately for Mma Makutsi, there is an aunt. There is always an aunt in Botswana, but this aunt it a jealous aunt. Mma Makutsi and Preious Ramotswe must navigate the tricky and unpleasant world of aunts to see Rra Raduphuti and give him the proper care which only a fiancee can provide.

Meanwhile there is some legal problems, a man who thought he was in love and was tricked in to making his house over to his fiancee has been duped out of it. He comes to Mma Ramotswe in desperation, he knows she cannot do anything really - but just maybe there is something. This is a nice little case which brings back a dark shadow from the past, Violet Sephotho!

In all the interlinked stories McCall Smith manages to invest strong voices in all his characters. I like the gentle wit and humour which underlies them all, for instance the internal discussion Mma Ramotswe goes through when wondering about offering tea to a client. Now that she is using the small teapot there is only tea for one person in it and with Grace away she cannot ask a man to make extra tea - so when a client arrives to talk to her she decides, after much internal reasoning, that it is better to not offer him tea. Until her (male) assistant offers to make tea out of the blue - and solves the problem.

McCall Smith sets his characters on Safari and while it might be expected that people of Botswana are used to the bush - they are not. They are urbanites, used to city living. The canoe trip to the safari camp is spiced by the enlightening chatter of the 'taxi driver' from hell. No disaster or problem or possible fatal end to them is left unrelished by him.

Full of wonderful touches of humour, this is another chapter in the life of the Number One Ladies Detective Agency.

Another emotion filled novel in the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series (#11). The main character is filled with so much kindness for others and for all things in God's creation. She is trying to assist a friend to reclaim his property, help locate an heir of a Chicago ladie's legacy, and to help a couple having marital problems (affairs). Her deputy detective has a problem with her fiancee's No. 1 Aunt. Good book with alot of wisdom to be gleaned from its pages.

Alexander McCall Smith is a skillful storyteller who gives his readers great pleasure whenever he publishes a new novel about Mma. Ranotswe and the Number One Ladies Detective Agency. One can always rely on Mr. Smith for a wise, friendly and knowing tale about the familiar characters of his ongoing series. In this latest installment Mma. Ranotswe tries to help a man cheated out of his home, find a tour guide in the wild Okavango Delta, and assist her dear friend and colleague Mma. Makutsi (who graduated summa cum laude from the Botswana Secretarial College with a 97% average) when her fiance has an accident, and his hostile aunt will not allow her to visit.

As always, the adventures are entertaining, but they serve merely as a background for the human lives of the characters, each of whom will seem like an old friend by page 30. Sr. Smith makes his characters real and engaging, and he brings the country of Botswana to life in a way that few writers can. Each book in this winning series can stand by itself as a good novel, providing heartwarming and engaging entertainment. This is not my typical "genre" of reading, but I recommend it to all, because these are truly excellent stories.

In which good old Botswana karma helps the # One Ladies' Detective solve the two main cases; in which that gold digging fifty per center Violet Sephoto perpetrates another injustice on men with money but is foiled as Mma Ramotswe intervenes and the vendetta grows; in which the betrothed Mma Makutsi and Mr.Phuti Radiphuti's marriage is put on hold due to a freak accident; in which in the case of spousal infidelity the husband isn't ALWAYS at fault; in which in spite of an excess of serendipity this reader cannot wait for more of Mma Ramotswe's gentle wisdom and Botswana common sense to be brought to bear against life's minor conundrums; and in which I say: "Alexander McCall Smith, bring on # 12."

This is the 11th installment in Alexander McCall Smith's enchanting and uplifting series about a female detective living in Botswana. It is not necessary to have read ALL the other books in the series, but if you haven't read any, this is probably not the best place to start.

The structure is very similar to others in the series, with the familiar cast of characters appearing. There are essentially four interwoven storylines. Mma Makutsi's fiance Mr Phuti Radiphuti is in an accident and she clashes with his aunt over who should nurse him back to health. Meanwhile, Mma Ramotswe has several cases on the go. She is asked to investigate whether a husband is being unfaithful, to assist another man who has been swindled out of his money and travels with Mma Makutsi to the Okavango Delta to track down a safari guide who has been left some money in a will. However these storylines often take a backseat to discussions about teapots, new boots and the merits of the new blue van.

The book opens with Mr J L B Matekoni musing about road rage and the futility of reacting to it and it ends with Mma Ramotswe musing about how to lead a good life. "Do not complain about your life. Do not blame others for things that you have brought upon yourself. Be content with who you are and where you are, and do whatever you can to bring to others such contentment, and joy, and understanding that you have managed to find yourself."

It's a lovely, warm and fuzzy novel that lives up in every way to the others in this gorgeous series.

what happened to lisette lecat's voice on this recording??? i have listened to lisette lecat narrating all the books and loved her voice and performance, although less so as we progress. the director is the same. so i was disturbed to find mma ramostwe sounding like a somnolent old woman and mma makutski soundding like violet sephoto. please put a little energy back so i can at least stay awake.