The Right Attitude to Rain ~ Alexander McCall Smith

The Right Attitude to Rain
By Alexander McCall Smith

You may know Alexander McCall Smith better as the mystery writer of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency Series but The Isabel Dalhousie Series also has some sort of mystery to the books, though it is often more of a puzzle than a mystery in the traditional sense. 

Isabel Dalhousie is a moral philosopher by profession and the editor of the Review of Applied Ethics. She lives in Edinburgh and her thoughts are often taken up with the moral questions of everyday life. 

In this latest installment, Isabel’s cousin, Mimi, and her husband, Joe, come for a visit from Texas. 

Mimi and Joe also know someone else visiting from Texas, Tom and his fiancé, Angie.  Tom invites them all to a house party, but there’s something not quite right about Tom and Angie.  Is Angie a gold digger?  Is she more dangerous than that?  Is that uncharitable of Isabel?  It preys on her mind.

As a moral philosopher, Isabel is often concerned with the right and wrong of situations and behavior.  When she first sees Tom and Angie, she reacts quite strongly to them.

“She found herself disliking them, this man and woman standing beside their expensive car, because of their arrogance.  She looked down into her coffee cup, and then up again.  No, she thought.  This is wrong.  You should not dislike people you do not know.”

The Right Attitude to Rain introduces a romantic element to the series.  Isabel has become quite enamored of Jaime, Cat’s ex, but he is 14 years younger than herself and she just can’t accept the idea.  Then she takes him to help inspect a flat she is considering purchasing for her housekeeper, Grace, as retirement security.  The owner takes a liking to the two of them, and offers to sell the flat for ten thousand less than the asking price.  She wants to help the couple out.  But they aren’t a couple and it would be dishonest to accept the flat under such misapprehension.  But it does start Isabel thinking, why not?  Why not her and Jamie?  Grace points out the obvious.  Cat probably won’t like it. 

 “…she’s going to be furious… the reason we know Cat would feel that way is that people are human.  That’s something you need to write about in that Review of yours.”

In fact, Cat doesn’t like it, even though she has taken up with someone else.  She is very jealous and even calls Isabel taking up with Jaime “disgusting.”

The story has a lot to do with change, both how far Isabel has come and how much she changes just in this book.  At the beginning of the book, she notes the changes since her marriage ended.

“… now she would see through John Liamor; and she had changed in other respects too.  She had become more forgiving, more understanding of human weaknesses than she had been in her twenties.  And love, too, had become more important to her...”

I read this some time ago but picked up the book on CD because I needed something to entertain me on my long commute; and I always find these books thought provoking and yet relaxing.  It is read with a pleasant Scottish accent which does not detract from the ability to understand what is being said and lends a much stronger feeling of Edinburgh.  It is well worth the listen, or the read, and if you find you like it, there is more available.  The Right Attitude to Rain is the third book but there are now eight books in the series with the ninth, The Uncommon Appeal of Clouds, due out in October 2012.