by Alexander McCall Smith

Tears of the Giraffe is the second book in Alexander McCall Smith’s, No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series. I wrote a review for the first book a few months back, and was pretty positive about the book with the one caveat that even though it was billed as a mystery, it was actually pretty skimpy with the mystery aspects of the book. I speculated that this was a result of it being the first book in the series and that in future books this would probably be less of a problem.

I have to report that I was wrong. The depth of the mystery in this book is only slightly greater then that of the original book. But you know what? It doesn’t matter. Tears of the Giraffe is an absolutely wonderful book; far better then the first, and what it lacks in mystery, it makes up in color and character.

The story centers about Precious Ramotswe, owner of the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency and her life in Botswana. As in the first book, she is hired to solve a number of cases. One case is brought to her by a mother searching for her long lost son and a second by a man who is wondering about some strange behavior involving his wife. Both stories are left unresolved for pretty much the full duration of the …

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by Alexander McCall Smith

I kept hearing all sorts of great things about “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency”, and since my wife already had a copy I thought I would give it a try.
“The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” is about a middle aged African woman, Precious Ramotswe, who decides to go into business for herself as a private detective. She funds the operation by selling off the cattle left to her by her late father. Her fathers’ plan was to have her start her own business upon his death but he had hoped that she would enter into an area a little more proven; like opening a store or a butcher shop. Precious has no experience as a private detective, but she figures that with a little common sense and a good book to guide her she should have no problem with her new business.

The business starts out slow which leads her to worry that becoming a private detective may have been a mistake, but soon things pick up and she’s dealing with all sorts of different clients and cases.

This is an interesting yet totally different type of book. The cases handled by Precious are pretty basic; there is no great intrigue or complicated plot going on here, yet it was a really fun book to read. Most of the entertainment comes …

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I’m Just Here For The Food: Food + Heat = Cooking

Written by : Alton Brown

If you really want to learn to cook, then this is the book for you. Most cookbooks consist of a list of ingredient, instructions for combining the ingredients, and temperatures and times for cooking your concoction. That’s all you need if all you want to do is prepare that one recipe, but what if you want more then that? What if you’re missing an ingredient and want to substitute something else or what
if you just want to be really bold and create your own recipe from scratch?

That’s where Alton Browns book, I’m Just Here For The Food - Food + Heat = Cooking, comes in.

I’m Just Here For The Food goes way beyond the normal cookbook. It not only teaches you how to cook something, but also why you are doing what you are doing when you cook something.

The book is divided into sections based on the various methods of cooking, such as searing, frying, braising and roasting and in each section Brown describes the physical and chemical processes that take place when your cooking food using the method. He tells you why you would select one method over another when cooking a specific dish and at the end of each chapter includes a number of recipes …

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Borderlands of Science

Written By : Charles Sheffield

The subtitle of this book is ‘How to Think Like a Scientist (and Write Science Fiction)’. I’m not sure that after you finish this book you will be able to do either, but you will have a good working knowledge of the latest concepts in cutting edge science.

Sheffield wrote this book as a reference for would be science fiction writers. It does not contain any information on writing technique or style but instead is a one stop shopping place for new story ideas and concepts. The book contains fourteen chapters, three of which are devoted to physics, one to chemistry and one to biology. There is an introductory chapter, a chapter on planetary studies, two on space flight and one each on computers, chaos theory and future war. A ‘Beyond Science’ chapter covers assorted topics that did not fit any where else and in the final chapter “The End of Science”, Sheffield takes on the belief that we are running out of scientific frontiers.

The book is very well written. Sheffield does a fine job presenting just the right amount of material for the layman without being condescending. He respects our intelligence but doesn’t assume that our backgrounds include a PHD in astrophysics. He uses math only when really necessary and walks us step by step through the relevant equations. After …

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