44 Scotland Street by Alexander McCall Smith

Fiction: Contemporary. Paperback from Abacus Books. Published in 2005. From the shelf of Pauline Roberts, Datchet, UK.

Since we are on holiday in England, I've been borrowing from Pauline's bookshelf. Since I had thought that I might like to read the next in the Isabel Dalhousie series, I picked this one up, thinking to see if it would improve any with the next book. I didn't look carefully enough though, and this book is a different set of characters, and not even a "detective' novel. I read it all the way through, though I was tempted to just give up a couple of times and got to the point I was just skimming whole pages to see if anything happened in the way of plot advancement. It was equally slow. Smith does do a lot of philosophizing and makes some good points. But, it was heavy on the philosophy and low on action.

Publisher's summary:
When Pat rents a room in Edinburgh, she acquires some interesting neighbors, including a pushy Stockbridge mother and her talented, sax-playing, 5-year-old son. Pat's job at an art gallery hardly keeps her busy, until she suspects one painting in the collection may be an undiscovered work from a Scottish master. As Pat handles the mystery of the painting, she and the people surrounding her confront issues of trust, love, and loss.

To view on amazon.co.uk, click here: 44 Scotland Street
on amazon.com, click here: 44 Scotland Street
and on Audible.com, here: 44 Scotland Street