Overview

In a beautiful and transporting volume of poems, the beloved author of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series takes us on a captivating journey from Africa to Greece, London to North America to Mumbai, and back home to Scotland, celebrating people, places, animals, and books. What matters most in life? For Alexander McCall Smith, it is friendship, love, and travel—the themes found throughout his work that have made him a cherished writer the world over. This first collection of McCall Smith’s poems reflects on these topics with all his characteristic wit and charm.   There are moments of sweeping insight and soaring feeling, and moments that will have you laughing along as they subtly shift your worldview. This inimitable writer shares his distinctively astute and good-natured observations on life, love, and beauty, reminding us of the deep satisfaction that can be found when we open ourselves up to the world with our whole heart, and watch as it takes on a kinder and gentler shape.

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9780593315989

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Reviews

This volume ... adds to an already rich and full bibliography, and perhaps the only surprise is [McCall Smith's] diversion toward poetry as a genre; the humanity, warmth, and intelligence are all familiar. . . . Meeting the creator of Mma. Ramotswe in another guise, as a gentle guide through life in many climates, is likely to prove irresistible for Alexander McCall Smith's dedicated fan base. -Library Journal

Praise for In a Time of Distance: His poetic voice is conversational, companionable, friendly. A 'maker of beautiful books, ' he writes, 'understands that text/ should whisper to us its message, / Like a confiding friend, /Not in the trumpet tones/ Of the strident, the polemical/ But gently, tactfully/ In the private places of exchange/ Where the loud and the angry/ Have no wish to linger.' It is such books, books like this one, that in a time of strident and dishonest polemics readers should attend to with a feeling ear. --Allan Massie, The Scotsman The many admirers of the fiction of Alexander McCall Smith will be totally charmed by a book of poems he has produced. He reveals the same genial, quietly wise persona, whether offering gentle philosophy about life, writing about the seven hills of Edinburgh or running an elegant series of sonnets. --The Herald

Author Information

ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH is the author of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency novels and of a number of other series and stand-alone books. His works have been translated into more than forty languages and have been best sellers throughout the world. He lives in Scotland.

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