Another by Alexander McCall Smith
Ah, Dostoevskian in his output, A Conspiracy of Friends, one of the second set of serial novels by the redoubtable author of the Number One Ladies Detective Agency series.
Reprint Time--Helena
A comment from the blogkeeper at Underbelly (thank you Buce) inspired me to look this up. I was fairly certain that I had reviewed the book in the recent past, and so I discovered this. a good book is worth appreciation--over and over and over again. Also, while you are appreciating, you might want to take in Underbelly's look at Helena as well. La Belle Hélène on March 18, 2005 8:11 AM In reading Helena last night I stumbled across a large number of passages I would like to share. But I thought the more important thing to share was an observation. Evelyn Waugh liked this best among his books. There are a good many reasons why this might be so: it is splendidly written--both the prose and the coherence are several notches above some of his earlier, more frenetic work. It is tightly done, with just the right strokes and exactly the right selection of detail. But I suspect the reason Waugh prized this above all the other works is that in t...
Why the reference to Dostoyevski?
ReplyDeleteOr was that merely a teaser?
Dear Fred,
ReplyDeleteOther than Joyce Carol Oates (and in the recent past Isaac Asimov) Alexander McCall Smith is one of the most prolific authors writing. He's relatively recent author who is producing a tremendous amount of material all the time--several books a year. That's the reference to Dostoevsky--sheer output. So much so that Dostoevsky is suspected of having temporal lobe epilepsy, which manifests in quite a different way than what we are used to for epilepsy.
shalom,
Steven
Steven,
ReplyDeleteOK. I was wondering. I have read some of Smith's works, and he never struck me as being especially Dostoyevskian in his writings.