Article first published as Book Review: The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party by Alexander McCall Smith on Blogcritics.
Precious Ramotswe is back, in the new paperback edition in The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series by author Alexander McCall Smith,
The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party
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Mma Ramotswe has a new and difficult client who she must try to help, but the real focus of the book, as with others in the series, is the gentle reminder to enjoy the beauty in life; and that many of life's problems, big and small, can eventually be solved with a little gentle tact and caring.
A nervous and not very likable farmer, Mr. Botsalo Moeti, has come to The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency for help in determining just who is behind some attacks on his cattle. As Mma Ramotswe tries to sort out the problem, and just how much she owes a client who may, in his own way, be in the wrong, there are also other complications closer to home.
She has been very much missing her beloved little white van and is unnerved by its possible, ghostly, reappearance.
One of the apprentices at Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni's garage, Charlie, also has a very big (and very little) problem that involves his imprudent girlfriend Prudence.
Plans for the wedding of assistant detective Mma Makutsi and her fiance Phuti Radiphuti are in full swing, but Mma Makutsi has some doubts that Phuti is taking care of his side of the planning. She is also having a difficult "conversation" with brand new pair of beautiful white wedding shoes. An added distraction — her ultimate nemesis and former classmate from the Botswana Secretarial College, Violet Sephotho, is running for a seat in Botswana's parliament, a fact that appalls Mma Makutsi.
The only disappointment in this entry to the series might be that Mma Ramotswe's and Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni's two adopted children, Motholeli and Puso, are so relegated to the background of the story that they have almost completely disappeared. It would be nice if Mr. McCall Smith would follow up on his earlier hints that the wheelchair-bound Motholeli, who showed an interest and talent for mechanics, might want to join her father at Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, and take on a more prominent role.
Mma Ramotswe uses her charm and smarts to resolve most of the novel's issues in her usual gentle and pleasant way, but
The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party also has some undercurrents of unrest. As much as Botswana is praised as a wonderful place that still honors the "old values," there are glimpses into the difficult life that people outside of a city like Gaborone face, with the characters of a mother and child who live on a farm and are in thrall to the new owner. McCall Smith wants to look at the bright side of life in most of his writing, but he also wants to remind his readers that there is still much poverty and suffering in Africa.
The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series continues to delight, and Precious Ramotswe and all of her friends and extended family are still people we want to spend some time with, attending
The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party, under the broad blue skies of Botswana, sipping red bush tea.
the host lays out her plan of attack, to travel the entire length of the north-flowing Nile, considered the longest river in the world, with a length of 4,132 miles (6,650 km). Like most travelers, she intends to take the trip "backwards," starting in Egypt, where the river's mouth spills into the Mediterranean, and ending at its source, at the Rwanda-Tanzania border.
. This trip seems a bit more personal, as Lumley has traveled to Greece many times before, since her first visit at the age of 20, and has a real love and rapport with the country. Once again she tours some of the most-visited and familiar sites, like the Acropolis in Athens, the Oracle at Delphi, the almost inaccessible monasteries of Meteora, and even climbs a bit of Mount Olympus, but there are always surprises in store. Some of the more offbeat destinations include the fabled the Gates of Hades, the site of a former leper colony, and a remote village where the remaining inhabitant speak in their own strange language of whistles. 
