Friends, Lovers, Chocolate

Alexander McCall Smith proved his genius with the The Sunday Philosophy Club, the debut novel in a second mystery series. The novel was as different from his Precious Ramotswe series as could be: Isabel Dalhousie is an extremely educated editor of an ethical journal in urban Edinburgh, while the kindly, clever but less sophisticated Mma Ramotswe labors in a smallish town in Botswana. Yet, you sense that the two women would get along like a house on fire if, by some miracle, they ever met.

This second novel featuring Isabel Dalhousie is even slower than the first. Unlike the first novel, there's no death. The mysteries are sort of un-mysteries. Nothing much happens, actually. Yet, although I couldn't tell you why, I really enjoyed show more Friends, Lovers, Chocolate. It revealed a great deal more about Isabel, her niece Cat and Cat's former lover Jamie. It's a character study rather than a mystery. Perhaps it is because Isabel and I are both the same age -- suddenly noticing that we're uncomfortably wedged into middle age -- but I really enjoyed the novel despite its meandering pace. It seemed like a leisurely stroll with a treasured aunt -- one like Isabel Dalhousie herself -- rather than an interminable evening with tiresome company. While I didn't enjoy this book as much as the first, it left me eager for the next Isabel Dalhousie book. show less

The title of this book might just as well have been “”The Heart of the Matter,” but unfortunately that one was taken. But one can picture Isabel Dalhousie, the main protagonist, pondering: “well, but would it be unethical to use the title also if it were apt?” Isabel, editor of the “Review of Applied Ethics,” ponders everything. As this late-thirties-early-forties-ish attractive woman roams the streets of Edinburgh, we are privy to many of her thoughts and observations. Smith is a very pleasing writer, and Isabel is an entertaining companion.

The “mystery” occupying Isabel isn’t much of one; I think of this book more as a way to spend a diverting day or two with lovely Scottish friends, rather than a nail-biting book show more you rocket through to solve the crime. Here we are dealing with matters of the heart: Isabel’s, her niece Cat’s, Cat’s ex-boyfriend Jamie’s, her housekeeper Grace’s, and Isabel’s new friend Ian’s. Ian has just had a heart transplant, and is suffering consequences that are perhaps mysterious, perhaps psychological. Isabel feels an ethical obligation to help him figure it out. The influence of the Scottish national poet Robert Burns has been deep in her life and in her culture, and thus she feels bound to her fellows: “a man’s a man, for a’ that.” But in all of these battles of the heart versus the brain, the characters confront the age-old dilemma: is it in fact “only with the heart that one can see rightly” (as per Antoine de Saint-Exupery) or should the brain be accorded hegemony? show less

The eponymous first book in Alexander McCall Smith's Sunday Philosophy Club series humbled me.

The second installment in the series, Friends, Lovers, Chocolate, expanded my musical horizons by introducing me to Many Waters Cannot Quench Love and John Ireland, for which I will be eternally grateful.

More than that, however, once again I found myself happily mentally noshing on the philosophical and ethical conundrums presented to Isabel throughout the book. Although Isabel certainly meddles, this time a a man with a heart transplant asks her for help when he begins to have visions of what he may believe may be his donor's murderer. Questions of cellular memory, the afterlife (and being open-minded enough to grant at least the possibility show more of an afterlife legitimacy), and even romance arise as Isabel finds herself drawn into her new friend's problem. Meanwhile, Isabel is forced to confront her feelings for Jamie (at least to some degree) and even indulges her less philosophical and ethical side, deftly preventing from becoming a boring Mary Sue and nicely shading in some depth to her character.

Once again, McCall Smith has given us a Scottish cozy that I enjoyed like a delicious, but messy pastry. At the end, there were some crumbs left, and like so many of Life's philosophical questions, the answer wasn't neat and tidy. But the path to finding it was satisfying as ever. From her niece Kat's shop to a rural bookstore, McCall's talent for drawing a reader into an environment with wholly believable characters makes this another successful installment.

I am beginning to love these books for what they are. Often, I pause reading to Google a word (few books challenge my vocabulary, but both of these installments have), a song, even an instrument (in this case, the contrabasoon). I always learn something and, because the ethical questions presented are interesting (even when they're the "fake" ones Isabel reviews for The Journal of Applied Ethics), just getting to mull those over is a bit like being able to continue to read while doing something else like the dishes.

The books are also a welcome respite when I need a break from many of the darker authors I read such as Denise Mina, Charles Todd, Tana French or Alex Grecian. The are cozies, a sub-genre I admit with chagrin I likely would still be snobbishly dismissing were it not for this series.

I was planning to read these around Christmas time every year, since my husband gifted himself into that tradition, but I already have the third installment and highly doubt I'll be able to wait that long this time.

You can find this review (with hyperlinks) and reviews of many other character series mysteries, primarily by British and Irish authors, on my blog at bodyonthefloor.blogspot.com show less

Pleasant reading about Edinburgh but not much of a plot to carry you through. It was filled out and I would say bogged down by quite a bit of philosophizing and knowledge display about mostly extraneous issues. As a man writing in a woman's persona, Smith wasn't very convincing. I've enjoyed his other books more, Ladies Detective Agency etc,

I didn't think I was going to try any more Isabel Dalhousie books, after not enjoying the first one too much... but when book bingo calls for me to read a book "set somewhere you have been"... let's be real, I'm always going to want it to be Edinburgh. And Alexander McCall Smith's writing style is a sort of siren call for me. So I decided to give the second book in the series a try.
I liked a lot of it. But ultimately, I guess I am still warming up to Isabel, and I'm not sure if I'll come to like her more in future books or not. She's a bit too ivory-tower for me. A bit unrelatable, a bit aimless? Although I've gotten used to AMC's philosophical, meandering style (and I relish it!), it just feels cranked up to a very high level with show more Isabel. And, so far, I do feel like she meddles too much in other people's quandaries, from purely philosophical motives. It just doesn't quite land for me. But I'm more willing to try another book in the series, just because I do enjoy the writing so much! show less

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Book Report: No life is perfect. Isabel Dalhousie would seem to be an exception to that rule, since she's rich, well-educated, and has a job she loves. (Hate her yet?) But all else being equal, which it never is, how can you hate a woman who believes it is a moral duty to help someone who most of us would call nutsy-cuckoo?

She meets a man who has had a heart transplant. He's troubled by dreams and memories of a man with a scarred eye, and a sense of foreboding and unhappiness connected with the face. Isabel sets out to help him discover the identity of the man in his dreams, and the search takes her into some odd territory. The resolution to the story is no surprise, but very interesting nonetheless.

But life show more being what it is, there is no shortage of other stuff going on in Isabel's life, including family drama, love affairs aborted and unformed (despite her now-explicit longing for a HIGHLY inappropriate man), and issues of moral consequence: What is our obligation to others when it risks compromising our own psychological well-being to act selflessly?

Or, in practical terms, do I **HAVE** to be nice to that scumbag douchetard that's sleepin' with My Man?

My Review: Even better than the first one! Bring on more, Mr. McCall Smith! show less

Isabel Dalhousie returns with more philosophical musings, ethical dilemmas, and anxieties over love and friendship. Her niece, Cat, is here again, along with Jaimie, who pines for he and Cat to reunite but satisfies himself with the friendship of Cat’s aunt, much to Isabel’s secret delight. Crime isn’t so much a factor in this tale, but there is plenty of questionable sleuthing and a fair bit of distraction.

I didn’t find this second offering in the Isabel Dalhousie series to be as satisfying as the first, though it was still enjoyable. The philosophical issue on which the action turns — the location of memory — doesn’t easily generate the kinds of moral probing that Isabel is better equipped to deal with. Or perhaps I was show more less interested in the other characters — Ian, the heart transplant recipient, and Tomasso, the potential liaison of either Cat or Isabel. But I do enjoy the numerous philosophical references, the citing of Auden, and the affection for Scotland that Isabel and, through her, McCall Smith evince.

Gently recommended. show less