Alexander McCall Smith

Isabel Dalhousie thinks often of friends, sometimes of lovers, and on occasion of chocolate. As an Edinburgh philosopher she is certain of where she stands. She can review a book called In Praise of Sin with panache and conviction, but real life is... well, perhaps a bit more challenging...

'I am a fortunate woman to have such an eventful life', observes Mma Ramotswe. Perhaps, but there are times when rather too much seems to be happening.

Sister Maria-Fiore dei Fiori Montagna, who is suffering from an acute identity crisis, wants to know more about her own past, and after doing a DNA test, she discovers that she has a relative she didn't know about.

Glasgow for Bertie is the promised land. The city of pies and Irn Bru, far from his controlling mother – his place of escape. But how will he respond to the news of the proposed merging of Edinburgh and Glasgow? A new member of Bertie’s class at school is causing ripples in his social circle....

Isabel Dalhousie is a new mother and a connoisseur of philosophy; she'd rather not be a sleuth. But when a chance conversation at a dinner party draws Isabel into the case of a doctor whose career has been ruined, she cannot ignore what may be a miscarriage of justice. Because for Isabel ethics...

Isabel Dalhousie applies her moral philosopher's mind to wrongdoings in Edinburgh and will have to call upon her powers of deduction and her unflappable moral code to unravel another social mystery....

Warm-hearted, humorous and wonderfully wise, Love in the Time of Bertie offers philosophical insight as well as sartorial elegance....

Even the arrival of her baby can't hold Mma Makutsi back from success in the workplace, and so no sooner does she becomes a full partner in the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency - in spite of Mma Ramotswe's belated claims that she is only 'an assistant full partner' - than she also launches a new...

As a mother, wife, employer and editor of the Review of Applied Ethics, Isabel Dalhousie is aware that to be human is to be responsible. So when a neighbour brings her a new and potentially dangerous puzzle to solve, once again Isabel feels she has no option but to shoulder the burden. A...

Business is slow at the number one ladies’ detective agency, so at Mma Makutsi’s suggestion, Mma Ramotswe is persuaded to take her first-ever holiday....

In Espresso Tales, Alexander McCall Smith returns home to Edinburgh and the glorious cast of his own tales of the city, the residents of 44 Scotland Street, with a new set of challenges for each one of them. Bruce, the intolerably vain and perpetually deluded ex-surveyor, is about to embark on a...

The Department of Sensitive Crimes is downsizing in light of a recent downturn of sensitive crime, and staff members are wondering who among them will be transferred elsewhere. As the bickering between colleagues intensifies, Ulf tries his best to stay above the fray....

Winner of the British Book Awards, Author of the Year, 2004. Winner of the CWA Dagger in the Library Award, 2004. Precious Ramotswe, that cheerful Botswanan private investigator of 'traditional build', is now married to Mr J.L.B. Matekoni of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors. The Agency is busy, but...

Winner of the British Book Awards, Author of the Year, 2004. Winner of the CWA Dagger in the Library Award, 2004. Amateur sleuth Isabel Dalhousie is a philosopher who uses her training to solve unusual mysteries. She edits the Review of Applied Ethics, addressing such questions as "Truth telling...

The winds of change are blowing through Scotland Street. Though Bertie is getting older, he can't resist an adventure to escape his domineering mother, and Bruce, ever the navel-gazer, will have to bring his best self to navigate the complexities of the pas de deux....

Jamie, a bassoonist, has been invited to play in a prestigious London concert. And they ring too when a wily philosopher, Christopher Dove, reveals a plot to topple Professor Robert Lettuce, a member of Isabel's editorial board.

The story revolves around the comings and goings at No. 44 Scotland Street, a fictitious building in a real street in Edinburgh. Immediately recognisable are the Edinburgh chartered surveyor, stalwart of the Conservative Association, who dreams of membership of Scotland's most exclusive golf...

In this latest movement in the symphony of her life, Isabel is faced with novel challenges, each of which tests her resolution to do the right thing. Dawn, a nurse in an infectious diseases ward, is let down by her lover and needs a place to live....

To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose; it is summer in Scotland Street (as it always is) and for the habitués of Edinburgh's favourite street some extraordinary adventures lie in waiting....

Even down to its well-set Georgian townhouses, Edinburgh is a hymn to measure and harmony. But on Scotland Street, domestic accord is in short supply. Matthew and Elspeth welcome three new arrivals, though the joys of multiple parenthood are somewhat lost due to sleep deprivation and the...