As always, Davina Porter is outstanding! Her Scottish voices take me right to Edinburgh! And the charm of Isabel Dalhousie is without question! I so want to sit at her kitchen table, listening to her chat with Grace!

great story, vivid and relatable characters. Davina Porter is the best storytellers I have ever had the pleasure to listen to.

I'm currently listening to book 5 in this series. I have loved them all and will be listening to the rest of them, as well. I originally thought they would be mysteries, but they're not really, although usually there is something odd going on that Isabel is trying to sort out. They remind me more of the 44 Scotland Street books, of which Audible does not have the complete series, so I had to find another. I'm glad I found this one.

The reason I decided to review this one is that, being the first book in the series, a new listener might look at these reviews first and I wanted to make a suggestion.

When I first started listening to these books, the picture of Isabel that formed in my mind was actually Maggie Smith, circa Harry Potter. I'm sure it was to do with the accent and Isabel's personality, combined with the roles I've seen Maggie Smith play. Ms. Smith is a wonderful actress and attractive, but she is much too old to be Isabel Dalhousie. This didn't matter so much in the beginning, but later in the series it does, and the image I've had all this time is hard for me to shake now.

So, in order to give some perspective to a new listener, I want to point out that Isabel is actually about the same age as, say, Jennifer Aniston. If you can picture Jennifer as a Scottish philosopher with an adult niece, you will be much closer to "reality" than I have been.

Other than that, the only advice I have is to relax and enjoy and prepare to be hooked.

Whereas I think I'd very much enjoy Isabel Dalhousie as a friend or tea companion, she is somewhat lame as an amateur Private Investigator. I have a minor in philosophy and a law degree, and I understand her many, many philosophical and ethical references very well. From a standpoint of the story, there are TOO many, and many of them are not really pertinent. That a woman of that maturity and sophistication does not seem to understand the emotional drives of herself or the people around her strains credulity as well. I've very much enjoyed McCall Smith in other works, particularly the "Ladies Detective Agency" series set in Botswana. I'd enjoy Isabel more with less meandering philosophy and more action. The actress, Davina Porter, who narrates is spot on.

Not enough resolution.

Her wide range of marvelous accents!

Maybe. A scriptwriter would tighten it up. I doubt most of Hollywood would get most of the what Isabel's talking about without their Wikipedia, anyway!

The listening experience would have been much more enjoyable if the plot and protagonist were more interesting.

I was particularly disappointed in the main character, Isabel Dalhousie. She was rather unlikable and tedious and her pontifications on ethics made me want to stop listening on more than occasion.

I have never listened to Davina Porter before, but I liked her narration.

I would cut Isabel Dalhousie! Unfortunately, that doesn't leave Alexander McCall Smith much to work with.

I had enjoyed reading another book by the author, and assumed (perhaps unfairly), that this book it would translate well into audio. His meandering style didn't capture my interest while listening, as it did while I was reading.

I was charmed by the main characters and the setting. I'm going through a phase where I like audio books that take me out of the U.S. (or into the past at least a century). There is just something inherently interesting about a setting

The narrator's accent was for me a delightful journey outside the U.S. without me having to sit through a long flight.

Smith is channeling a woman's voice and a wonderful one at that: intelligent and warm. More please.

I have read and reread all of Alexander McCall Smith's books about Botswana and the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. I absolutely adored the series.
So when his new book came out about Scotland, I thought it would be the same caliber. I bought the book and immediately downloaded it for listening. Tonight I finished the book and I want to warn other fans to avoid this book at all costs.
First of all, the "Sunday Philosophy Club" is mentioned only briefly in the book and never meets. What is the point in the title???
Secondly, since Isobel, the heroine, is a philosopher, over half of the book is about her philosophical musings about ethics. This book has no real plot or action.
Finally, the murder, about which the entire book is based, is not a murder at all. Just an unfortunate accident. If I am giving away the plot, believe me, you haven't lost much.

This is the first book in Smith's latest series, and I enjoyed the narration as much as I did with the Mma Ramotswe audiobooks. The Mma Ramotswe stories are such a universal success because they are universally accessible and warm, but Smith's previous characters have, like this one, been more academic in their musings. While the Ladies Detective Agency series is surely his masterpiece, this new series is wonderful literature to look forward to as well.

This is a very slow, thin book with little character development and less plot. The amusement in it is the extraction of major philosophical and moral debates from very minor daily life. It's calm, not unpleasant, but not much more.