Wednesday, March 17, 2010

"...at night we are all strangers, even to ourselves..."


(No. 1) Ladies' Detective Agency came home with my on my book pilgrimage to the parents. Especially during student teaching, I am only reading books I own. Your welcome library, you get a break.

I remember the fuss over Detective Agency and I remember my mom reading them, but they never made it out of my to-read list until now...years later. And yes I realize they have made it into a show on HBO. And no that isn't why I'm reading it. We all know I don't have cable.

I'm pretty much head over heals for Alexander McCall Smith and his characters. The book takes place in Africa and is broken up into problem solving vignettes with pithy endings. They rather reminded me of what I call the Anansi Stories. Which means each little piece of the larger story gives you witticisms, triumph, and closure.

I also see a pattern forming of liking literature where women are smart, witty, and show men a thing or two not out of spite but because the women also have something of value to offer the world.

The happy ending doesn't hurt either.


"The problem, of course, was that people did not seem to understand the difference between right and wrong. They needed to be reminded about this, because if you left it to them to work out for themselves, they would not bother. They would just find out what was best for them, and then they would call that the right thing."
Alexander McCall Smith

2 comments:

  1. Oh, I've wanted to read this for such a long time! I remember hearing about the books on NPR a long time ago and they sounded so neat. Thank you for the reminder!

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  2. I was in a book club a couple years ago and this book was chosen by someone but I think it was voted down. At the time I rolled my eyes at it, but since you enjoyed it I won't pass it by next time!
    (Sounds like a good beach read, it would look good in my new beach bag!)

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