Title: Blue Shoes and Happiness
Author: Alexander McCall Smith
This is the seventh (or maybe eighth?) novel in The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series. I'm not sure why I keep reading them, but every time I see one on the shelf at the library, I pick it up. It's hard for me to quantify, but there's something about these books that makes them different from most of what I read. I think it's that the pace of life seems different in Botswana. Everything seems to be a little bit more relaxed and move a little bit more slowly. Most of the mysteries I read about America are about murders and violent crimes, whereas the mysteries Precious Ramotswe solves seem to be closer to home-- family issues, job problems, etc... I enjoy the books, but often feel like they're sort of deceptively simple, meaning that they're not really as simplistic as they seem. Anyway, the mysteries Mma Ramotswe and Mma Matsuke solve in the latest installment have already become one with all of the other mysteries they solved in the other novels, but I feel like I get to know them better, and get to know more about human nature, every time I read one of these books.
--originally posted 9/27/06
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