In the Company of Cheerful Ladies

infobox Book |
name = In the Company of Cheerful Ladies
orig title =
|

image_caption = Cover of the first edition (Polygon Press)
author = Alexander McCall Smith
cover_artist = Design: Barrie Tullett & James Hutcheson; photo: Sandy Grant
country = Scotland
language = English
series = The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series
genre = Detective, Mystery novel
publisher = Polygon Press
pub_date = 2004
media_type = Print (Hardback & Paperback), Audio (Cassette & CD)
pages = 231 pp (1st edition hardback)
isbn = ISBN 1-904598-06-4
preceded_by = The Full Cupboard of Life (2004)
followed_by = Blue Shoes and Happiness (2006)

"In the Company of Cheerful Ladies" is the sixth in The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series of novels by Alexander McCall Smith, set in Gaborone, Botswana, and featuring the Motswana protagonist Precious Ramotswe.

Plot introduction

Work and personal worries, and shadows from the past, threaten the happiness of Mma Ramotswe and her new husband Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. But her assistant, Mma Makutsi, and a new employee to whom Mma Ramotswe has been kind, are determined to repay their debt of gratitude by helping her in their turn. The problems are overcome, and Mma Makutsi herself finds love at last.

Plot summary

Mma Ramotswe and her new husband settle down to married life with their foster-children, but problems are piling up. At Mr J.L.B. Matekoni's own house, the tenant is running an illegal drinking den. Then Charlie, the apprentice, gets entangled with a wealthy married woman and quits his job after a row with Mma Makutsi. Help arrives in the person of Mr Polopetsi, whom Mma Ramotswe accidentally knocks off his bicycle with her van. He has been unemployed following a spell in prison after what appears to have been a miscarriage of justice, and Mma Ramotswe persudes her husband to employ him out of guilt and sympathy, but he proves an asset to the garage. He has tracking skills too, and when Mma Ramotswe's van is stolen after a breakdown, he finds it for her.

Mma Ramotswe's violent ex-husband Note Mokote reappears. She is frightened, having never obtained a divorce from him before marrying again. Note tries to blackmail her, but Mma Ramotswe discovers that he actually married her bigamously, so their marriage was invalid and she is legally married to Mr J.L.B Matekoni after all. Surrounded by her husband and friends at the garage, she finds the courage to dismiss Note and forgive him.

Mma Makutsi's love prospects improve when she starts dancing lessons and is partnered with another student, Mr Radiphuti. At first she tries to avoid him, as he is awkward and stammers, but he turns out to be a kind and gentle man with a good job in his father's business, and a romance begins. She removes some of Mma Ramotswe's burden of worry by solving an important fraud investigation on her own, and manoeuvring Charlie back to work. Mr Radiphuti's father enlists the help of Mma Ramotswe to put a proposal of marriage from his shy son to Mma Makutsi, and the two become engaged.

Literary significance and reception

This was the first of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency novels to be printed in hardback, with a very large initial print run of 101,000 copies to meet the anticipated demand [cite web|url=http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/entertainment.cfm?id=950962004|title="The Scotsman": Precious success puts publisher in major league. 17 August 2004] . Its critical reception was mixed: "The Scotsman" stated that "McCall Smith’s beautiful evocation of life in Botswana offers sagacity, charm and a feeling of fable, combined with an utter and truthful sense of place, of belonging [cite web|url=http://living.scotsman.com/books.cfm?id=991852004|title="The Scotsman": Art of Simple Truth. Tom Adair, 28 August 2004] ; however, "The Sunday Times" called the book "lacking in narrative drive" and concluded that "...some readers may wish to escape to somewhere a little more invigorating" [cite web|url=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article467922.ece|title="The Sunday Times": Review of the novel by Peter Parker, 15 August 2004] .

In 2004, the year of the novel's publication, Alexander McCall Smith won the Author of the Year award at the British Book Awards [cite web|url=http://www.britishbookawards.co.uk/pnbb_previouswinners.asp?|title=British Book Awards website: List of previous winners] and the Crime Writers Association Dagger in the Library award [cite web|url=http://www.thecwa.co.uk/daggers/index.html#library|title=Crime Writers Association website: list of Dagger award winners] , both for the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series.

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