The Double Comfort Safari Club (No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series #11)
Alexander McCall Smith, 2010
Knopf Doubleday
240 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780307277480
Summary
Readers will agree that this touching and dramatic new installment in Alexander McCall Smith’s beloved and best-selling series is the finest yet. In this story, Precious Ramotswe deals with issues of mistaken identity and great fortune against the beautiful backdrop of Botswana’s remote and striking Okavango Delta.
Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi head to a safari camp to carry out a delicate mission on behalf of a former guest who has left one of the guides a large sum of money. But once they find their man, Precious begins to sense that something is not right. To make matters worse, shortly before their departure Mma Makutsi’s fiancé, Phuti Radiphuti, suffers a debilitating accident, and when his aunt moves in to take care of him, she also pushes Mma Makutsi out of the picture.
Could she be trying to break up the relationship? Finally, a local priest and his wife independently approach Mma Ramotswe with concerns of infidelity, creating a rather unusual and tricky situation. Nevertheless, Precious is confident that with a little patience, kindness and good sense things will work out for the best, something that will delight her many fans. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—August 24, 1948
• Where—Bulawayo, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe)
• Education—Christian Brothers College; Ph.D., University
Edinburgh
• Honors—Commandre of the Order of the British Empire
(CBE); Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE)
• Currently—lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
Alexander (R.A.A.) "Sandy" McCall Smith, CBE, FRSE, is a Rhodesian-born Scottish writer and Emeritus Professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh. In the late 20th century, McCall Smith became a respected expert on medical law and bioethics and served on British and international committees concerned with these issues. He has since become internationally known as a writer of fiction. He is most widely known as the creator of the The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series.
Alexander McCall Smith was born in Bulawayo, in what was then Southern Rhodesia and is now Zimbabwe. His father worked as a public prosecutor in what was then a British colony. He was educated at the Christian Brothers College before moving to Scotland to study law at the University of Edinburgh, where he received his Ph.D. in law.
He soon taught at Queen's University Belfast, and while teaching there he entered a literary competition: one a children's book and the other a novel for adults. He won in the children's category, and published thirty books in the 1980s and 1990s.
He returned to southern Africa in 1981 to help co-found and teach law at the University of Botswana. While there, he cowrote what remains the only book on the country's legal system, The Criminal Law of Botswana (1992).
He returned in 1984 to Edinburgh, Scotland, where he lives today with his wife, Elizabeth, a physician, and their two daughters Lucy and Emily. He was Professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh at one time and is now Emeritus Professor at its School of Law. He retains a further involvement with the University in relation to the James Tait Black Memorial Prize.
He is the former chairman of the British Medical Journal Ethics Committee (until 2002), the former vice-chairman of the Human Genetics Commission of the United Kingdom, and a former member of the International Bioethics Commission of UNESCO. After achieving success as a writer, he gave up these commitments.
He was appointed a CBE in the December 2006 New Year's Honours List for services to literature. In June 2007, he was awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Laws at a ceremony celebrating the tercentenary of the University of Edinburgh School of Law.
He is an amateur bassoonist, and co-founder of The Really Terrible Orchestra. He has helped to found Botswana's first centre for opera training, the Number 1 Ladies' Opera House, for whom he wrote the libretto of their first production, a version of Macbeth set among a troop of baboons in the Okavango Delta.
In 2009, he donated the short story "Still Life" to Oxfam's 'Ox-Tales' project—four collections of UK stories written by 38 authors. McCall Smith's story was published in the Air collection. (From Wikipedia.)
Book Reviews
Mma Ramotswe’s observations not only inevitably expose her suspects, but also reveal much about humanity as a whole.... [McCall Smith] is a master.... There’s beauty and revelation of one kind or another woven expertly into every line.
Christian Science Monitor
These novels...loft the spirits. They make the reader feel good—about life, the world, the basic decency of people.... They are wise.
Winston-Salem Journal
McCall Smith is a vivid observer and an elegant writer, honoring Botswanan customs and culture.... Like the best traditions, this series is one we hope will endure.
Cleveland Plain Dealer
As in 2009’s Tea Time for the Traditionally Built, the previous entry in this beguiling, bestselling series, a personal crisis for one of the leads, rather than a mystery, drives the plot of Smith’s superb 11th novel set in Botswana featuring his infinitely understanding sleuth, Precious Ramotswe. When a delivery truck backs into Phuti Radiphuti, the fiancé of Mma Ramotswe’s prickly and insecure assistant, Grace Makutsi, and crushes his leg against a wall, Phuti’s rude aunt won’t allow Grace to visit her beloved in the hospital. Meanwhile, the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency tries to help the executor of an American woman, who wished to leave some money to a kind tour guide, but couldn’t recall the guide’s name. The resolution to the problem of another client, who was cheated out of his home by a gold-digger, might strike some as unduly fortuitous, but it makes sense within the framework of these books, which are more about humanity than logic.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) New challenges and an exciting adventure await Botswana lady detective Precious Ramotswe in this eleventh entry in the much-beloved series.... As always, wrongs are righted and all is resolved, thanks to the wit and wisdom of these two shrewd Mmas. Even after nearly a dozen installments, McCall Smith manages to keep his series engaging and fresh. Expect much demand: the release of a new No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency novel is always cause for celebration among the author’s many fans —Allison Block
Booklist
Mma Precious Ramotswe's 11th full cupboard of cases takes her from her office in Gaborone into a safari camp to track down the elusive heir to an unexpected legacy. On her deathbed, Estelle Grant, late of St. Paul, Minn., amended her will to leave $3,000 to the guide who'd been kind to her on a safari to the Okavango Delta, but she couldn't remember the name of the guide or the camp. Can the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (Tea Time for the Traditionally Built, 2009, etc.) locate the beneficiary and inform him of his good fortune? Only if Mma Ramotswe can find the time to spare from the rest of her caseload. Her old friend, senior midwife Constance Mateleke, is convinced that her inattentive husband is carrying on an affair and wants the agency to find evidence she can use in her divorce proceedings. Government biologist Robert Monageng Kereleng, whose family business has already been plundered by an employee who fled to South Africa, wants Mma Ramotswe to help him recover the house he'd unwisely deeded to an avaricious girlfriend who has no intention of sharing it with him. And Mma Grace Makutsi, the agency's secretary and assistant detective, has problems of her own: Not only has her fiance, furniture salesman Phuti Radiphuti, been hospitalized with a serious injury, but his territorial aunt won't let Mma Makutsi near him. All these problems are solved with Mma Ramotswe's customary grace and wisdom, though it would take a sharp reader to see which of them will prove the most intransigent.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni thinks of himself as less clever than his wife. What happens in the opening scene that proves him to be as observant and intuitive as Mma Ramotswe herself (pp. 7–14)?
2. The differences between men and women have long been a topic of discussion between Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi. Mma Makutsi thinks, “Of course men and women were different, and women were, on the whole, different in a better way. . . . Women were capable of doing rather more than men” (p. 38). Does this prove true in the course of the story?
3. Botswana is more than just a setting in these stories. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni thinks about the country as he drives to the aid of Mma Mateleke (p. 4), while Mma Ramotswe thinks about her father’s Botswana “in which young people had shown respect for older people” (p. 34). What does Botswana represent, for Mma Ramotswe particularly?
4. Mma Makutsi challenges the patience and kindness of Mma Ramotswe often in this novel. How does Mma Ramotswe respond to Grace’s suggestion about switching teapots? Why does she buy Grace a new pair of boots?
5. “How to Love Your Country Again” is a chapter that appears not to advance the plot. What is the purpose, then, of this seeming pause in the story? What are some of the observations and reflections here that provide insight into Mma Ramotswe’s character?
6. What is at stake in the struggle between Grace and Phuti’s aunt? Do you find Phuti’s timidity disturbing as the story goes on? Is this an aspect of his character that Grace fully accepts?
7. What is the lesson of the visiting priest who gives the sermon in the cathedral? Why does Mma Ramotswe change her mind about telling people not to weep (pp. 67–68)?
8. Mma Ramotswe defines wisdom as “an understanding of the feelings of others and of what would work and what would not work; which stood by one’s shoulder and said this is right or this is wrong, or this person is lying or this person is telling the truth” (p. 34). What do you think of this definition of the term? Is wisdom the key to her success as a detective?
9. Violet Sephotho has convinced Robert Kereleng to put his new house in her name. Why does her plan backfire (pp. 147–49)? Why is Grace so happy about this (pp. 153–54)?
10. When Precious and Grace travel to the Okavango Delta, several comic scenes develop. What are some of your favorite funny moments during their trip?
11. Mma Ramotswe has been hired to find an unnamed guide at a safari camp, to whom an American woman has left a large amount of money. A coincidence—two women named Mrs. Grant—causes Mma Ramotswe to tell the wrong man he will receive the bequest. But another coincidence resolves the difficulty (pp. 187, 194). Would you consider this outcome a matter of plot manipulation or a plausible situation, given the closeness of kinship ties in a place like Botswana?
12. Why does Mma Potokwane succeed in the confrontation with Phuti’s aunt? What is Mma Potokwane willing to do that Mma Ramotswe did not do (pp. 206–10)? Is this because Mma Ramotswe is too kind to act forcefully?
13. In most detective fiction, readers seek the identity of the criminal or the resolution of a mystery. Who is the guilty party, and what if anything is the mystery, in The Double Comfort Safari Club? How does Mma Ramotswe differ from most fictional detectives? How do plot and pace differ, and what other unique features distinguish the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series from other detective fiction?
14. How does Mma Ramotswe figure out what is going on in Mma Mateleke’s marriage? How well does she manage her tricky conversations with the husband and the wife?
15. The novel’s ending brings a happy reunion of Grace and Phuti, who says that Grace will be “Mma Radiphuti . . . very soon now” (p. 210). Do you expect that the marriage will take place in the next installment?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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