Fiction review: The Lost Art of Gratitude

FICTION

Isabel Dalhousie has a few problems. But don't worry. They're small. After all, she's a character created by that industrious publishing juggernaut officially known as Alexander McCall Smith, and he isn't in the habit of giving his creations terminal illnesses or confronting them with armed thugs.

So what problems confront Dalhousie, philosopher and editor of the "Review of Applied Ethics"? As "The Lost Art of Gratitude" (the sixth novel to feature Dalhousie) begins, her accountant is unhappy with her record-keeping habits. The previous editor of the review is accusing her of plagiarism.

And most troublingly, Minty Auchterlonie, whom Dalhousie had suspected of insider trading in a previous novel, shows up in a café with a son about the same age as Dalhousie's 18-month-old son and -- brace yourself -- invites Dalhousie and Charlie to the boy's birthday party.

Has Minty no mercy?

Actually, Dalhousie's child -- his mother's innocent surrogate in the women's ongoing cold war -- seems to suffer more than she does. Here's a sample of Charlie's suffering at the hands of Auchterlonie's id-driven Roderick:

"Roderick, at this point having abandoned his attempt to remove Charlie's boot, had grabbed hold of his ankle, which he was trying to twist. Charlie watched, wide-eyed, but impassively. Gradually Roderick gained purchase and began to dig his tiny fingernails into Charlie's skin. It was too much; Charlie turned red and opened his mouth to cry."

Tortured children aside, it's not so bad, is it? McCall Smith's adults -- at least the good ones -- spend a lot of time wide-eyed, but they rarely cry. If forced to summarize in a single sentence McCall Smith's fictional worlds (especially the ones set in Edinburgh), you might use this one, which appears early in "The Lost Art of Gratitude": "It was a perfect morning, the best sort of early summer morning, and all he felt was love."

But what McCall Smith weaves out of his gentle conflicts is wondrous -- especially when Auchterlonie claims she's a blackmail victim. The reason: Her husband isn't Roderick's biological father. (Gasp!) Soon Dalhousie, too nice for her own good, finds herself meeting the blackmailer, with an offer of cash to keep him quiet.

Forget the bookkeeping woes. Now we're cooking with gas.

With "The Lost Art of Gratitude," McCall Smith has produced his second hardcover novel since April, and his American publisher will issue a third hardcover novel in December. That's in addition to three new paperbacks for American readers this year. Can this writer do no wrong?

Doug Childers is a Richmond writer and edits WAG, a literary Web site at http://www.thewag.net.