"The World According To Bertie" by Alexander McAll Smith

I was interrupted many times and faltered in my commitment to completing it when I didn't get back to it for a week or two but finished it yesterday afternoon when I was too tired to do anything more constructive with my time. I have read the first four of Mr McAll Smith's No.1 Ladies Detective Agency novels and heard him speak on the literary lunch broadcast by 774 on two occasions. He's a clever and witty man with a wonderful manner as a speaker and I love that his novels are not too "up themselves". It isn't that they aren't clever - there are the themes and quite a volume of knowledge to make you curious about things you wouldn't have known to be curious about otherwise - but they are more playful and lighthearted than something written to impress the criterati*. I found this book for three dollars at an opp shop - brand new, they had a pile of surplus stock from someplace - and although it is the third (I think) in a series I haven't read, I thought I'd read it anyway.

As a consequence of not having read the preceding novels in the series, I wont comment on the narrative. What I loved, though, was the characters. A wonderful mixture. Some of them might be described as exaggerated, caricatures, with particular traits applied to extremes which made them fascinatingly vulgar - like Dickens' fabulous characters (oh how I want to read my next Dickens book but it is very thick and I can't be bothered holding it up in bed!). However, I suspect that this is what people are really like, in general. They are not just mild variations from a central point on a two or three-dimensional axis. One of the trait theories of personality has sixteen different qualities, I think, and I suggest that on at least a few of these, all of us are in some quite extreme position. My point being that Bruce and Julia and Irene may well be caricatures but that doesn't make them any less realistic.

The character who worried me most was Bertie's mother, Irene. Oh please God, don't let me be like that! Many people would probably view my parenting style in a similar way that hers was veiwed by every other character in the book and by the horrified reader (me). Let that serve as warning to myself: ease up. Does that mean I shouldn't have insisted that DD eat all her breakfast this morning (I knew she would ask for a biscuit or date five minutes later and she did) or does it mean that I shouldn't beat myself up about how mean I felt refusing to get her out of her chair until she'd eaten another two spoons of porridge?

There were some nice quotes and references too, one coming from Auden who, it seems is a rather famous poet with whom I am not familiar:"let the more loving one" - I am off to find the full text online because I am curious as to the context in which it was written.

I would read any of his books from any of his series in any order, but preferably the right order as that could only add to my pleasure.

My next book is "The White Tiger" by Aravind Adiga. It has come highly recommended and I have read the first few pages. I think I will enjoy the writing style and it wonder if it will effect the manner of my blogs whilst I am reading it...

*This is a word I made up recently and am quite pleased with, although I suspect that I haven't made it up at all and that it popped into my head when I needed it on account of my having vaguely read it elsewhere whilst distracted with a gorgeous child.