44 Scotland Street

The story revolves around the comings & 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 club. We have the pushy Stockbridge mother, & her prodigiously talented five-year-old son, who is making good progress with the saxophone & with his Italian. Then there is Domenica Macdonald who is that type of Edinburgh lady who sees herself as a citizen of a broader intellectual world. In McCall Smith's hands such characters retain charm & novelty, simultaneously arousing both mirth & empathy. 

44 Scotland Street is vintage McCall Smith, tackling issues of trust and honesty, snobbery & hypocrisy, love & loss, but all with great lightness of touch. Clever, elegant & funny, this is a novel that provides huge entertainment but which is underpinned by the moral dilemmas of everyday life & the characters' struggles to resolve them. 

Contains an exclusive extract from The Department of Sensitive Crimes, the first novel in the new Detective Varg series by Alexander McCall Smith.