Two audio books that I listened to in April, both bought with 'credits' included in my Audible membership.
Book 2 in the Ali Dawson series*
Release date: 2026-02-12
Book 1 was called The Frozen People, and was reviewed by me here a year ago.
Audible's introduction:
Ali Dawson is a police detective who leads a unit that investigates cases so cold her team must travel to the distant past to solve them. But Ali and the team haven't been allowed to time-travel ever since their technical expert, Jones, got stuck in Victorian London.
To distract herself, Ali looks into a present-day case - an apparent suicide of a young man who fell to his death from a high building. She believes the death is linked to a psychic medium called Barry Power, who convinced the boy he could fly. Ali goes to one of Power's shows where he claims to be in contact with Jones.
When Ali notices that evening that her cat, Terry, has gone missing, she decides to go back in time just long enough to prevent Terry from escaping through his open cat flap. A dangerous plan which backfires, and she finds herself once more in Victorian London, where she meets Jones, as well as Power...
My opinion: I still find myself struggling a bit with the time travelling concept in this series - but from her previous books, I know that Elly Griffiths is a good writer; and if this is going to be a longer series, I suppose she may also be planning to develop those ideas further in later books. (The "rules" involved still do not seem to be quite clear even to the characters experimenting with it in the books...)
Thinking about it now, it also strikes me that in a way, perhaps the idea of time travelling is not really all that far-fetched for an author who already wrote a long series with an archaeologist (Ruth Galloway) as the main character... Those books too do involve quite a lot of "digging into the past", even if in a (literally) more "down to earth" way... (haha)
You can find more info about the author and her books on her own website
* * * * *
by Alexander McCall Smith
Book 25 in the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series
Release date: 2024-09-05
Audiobook 8 hrs
Narrated by Adjoa Andoh
Mma Ramotswe has a deft hand in delicate cases, and never allows an act of injustice to pass unanswered. So, when it comes to her attention that a matter involving dubious motives has arisen, and that it will require the utmost discretion to resolve, she has no choice but to lend her skills in the arts of detection and reconciliation. She is, after all, head of Botswana’s premier detective agency, but that doesn’t mean she can’t use the help of Mma Makutsi and Mma Potokwane. Meanwhile, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni has found himself in complicated circumstances of his own, requiring not a little of Mma Ramotswe’s time and expertise.
In the end, as each of these predicaments comes untangled, Mma Ramotswe draws on her goodwill and generosity to bring important truths to light – of friendship, honesty and love.
My opinion: I'm quite impressed that Alexander McCall Smith has managed to write yet another book in this long series, and is still able to make them enjoyable - with the main characters still remaining essentially "themselves", but also developing a bit. I always find them quite relaxing reading. (In the past I've borrowed most of them from my local library.)
