44 Scotland Street (2005) is the first book in the 'dry, funny, hugely entertaining, with its glittering cast of rogues, oddballs and innocents' 44 Scotland Street series.
Paperback: Scotland Street occupies a busy, bohemian corner of Edinburgh's New Town, where the old haute bourgeoisie finds itself having to rub shoulders with students, poets and portraitists. And number 44 has more than its fair share of the street's eccentrics and failures.
When Pat - on her second gap year and a source of some worry to her parents - is accepted as a new tenant at number 44, she isn't quite sure how long she'll last.
Her flatmate Bruce, a rugby-playing chartered surveyor, is impossibly narcissistic, carelessly philandering and infuriatingly handsome.
Downstairs lives the gloriously pretentious Irene, whose precocious five-year-old is in therapy after setting fire to his father's copy of the Guardian.
And then there is the shrewd, intellectual Domenica MacDonald, mysteriously employed but a sharp-eyed observer of the house's activities in her spare time.
About the author: Alexander McCall Smith was born in Zimbabwe and educated there and in Scotland. He was Professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh and served on national and international bodies concerned with bioethics. His books include works on medical law, criminal law and philosophy, as well as numerous books for children, collections of short stories, and novels including the award-winning The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency and The Corduroy Mansions series. He has lectured at various universities in Africa, including Botswana, where he lived for a time. He is married to an Edinburgh doctor, and has two daughters.
Rating: 5/5
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