“An escape from life’s woes as well as a suggestion for how to make the whole deal more palatable—fragility, fruit cake, and all.” —The Boston Globe
Grace Makutsi’s husband, Phuti Radiphuti, is in a bind. An international firm is attempting to undercut his prices in the office furniture market. Phuti has always been concerned with quality and comfort, but this firm seems interested only in profits. To make matters worse, they have a slick new advertising campaign that seems hard to beat.
Meanwhile, Grace is approached by an old friend who has a troubled son. She and Phuti agree to take Patience and Modise in and lend a hand, but things don’t work out quite as intended, and the situation proves difficult for them to handle. It will require not only all of their persistence and dedication but also help from an unexpected quarter to find a solution that will make everyone happy.
Faced with more than her fair share of delicate dilemmas, Mma Makutsi deals with it all with her usual graciousness. This—along with the kindness, generosity, and good sense for which the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency is known—assures us that, in the end, each of these matters will be set right.
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Creators
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Series
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Publisher
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Release date
September 6, 2022 -
Formats
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Kindle Book
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OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9780593316986
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EPUB ebook
- ISBN: 9780593316986
- File size: 1885 KB
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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Library Journal
April 1, 2022
Even as Grace Makutsi's husband faces cutthroat competition from an international firm seeking to price him out of the office furniture market with a sleezy campaign touting subpar products, he and Mma Makutsi agree to help a friend's troubled child. Mma Ramotswe and grande dame Mma Potokwani pitch in, and the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency triumphs again.
Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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Booklist
Starred review from August 1, 2022
McCall Smith choreographs an ingenious "trickster tricked" plot here, centered on a swarm of cutthroat businesspeople and one surly teenager. Precious Ramotswe, founder of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, Botswana's only private-investigations business run by women, is on the case in this twenty-third adventure in the series. First on the agenda is a plot that might destroy the Double Comfort Furniture Store, the life's work of Phuti, the husband of Precious' friend and colleague, Grace Makutsi. A rival business, specializing in minimalist "Twenty-first Century Chairs," is slashing prices and using the alluring, ever-scheming Violet Sephotho (sworn enemy of Grace Makutsi) in its advertising. Then there's the surly teenager and his role in derailing the happiness of Grace's childhood friend, a woman who was forced, as a teen herself, to bear a child after being raped. Precious and Grace join forces in an elaborate sting operation designed to expose these agents of mayhem. Their plot includes concocting an ad campaign of their own and hiring an actor to play a domestic scene. As they would sink into one of Phuti's large, overstuffed, extremely comfortable armchairs, so will readers delightedly immerse themselves in descriptions of the Botswana landscape; in Precious and Grace's conversations over mugs of red bush tea; and in the doings of the rest of the cast of comic characters. Another delight from the prolific McCall Smith.COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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