Nov. 06, 2015
Edmonton, AB
Myer Horowitz Theatre
Nov. 07, 2015
Vancouver, BC
The Vogue Theatre
Nov. 08, 2015
Victoria, BC
McPherson Playhouse
Nov. 12, 2015
Toronto, ON
John Bassett Theatre

Paul Mercs Concerts is pleased to announce the Canadian 2015 tour dates of Alexander McCall Smith, the beloved bestselling author of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency Series, 44 Scotland Street & The Sunday Philosophy Club Series.

Alexander McCall Smith has written and contributed to more than 100 books, including specialist academic titles, short story collections, and a number of immensely popular children’s books. He is best known for his internation­ally acclaimed and bestselling No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series, which currently has 14 volumes. The series has now been translated into 45 languages and has sold over 25 million copies worldwide. The first episode of a film adaptation, directed by Anthony Minghella, and produced by the Weinstein Company, premiered on HBO in March 2009. The 15th book in the series is The Handsome Man’s Deluxe Café.

 

Another series, beginning with The Sunday Philosophy Club, about an intriguing woman named Isabel Dalhousie, appeared in 2004 and immediately leapt onto national bestseller lists, as did its sequels, the tenth of which, The Novel Habits of Happiness, will be published in summer 2015. McCall Smith’s serial novel, 44 Scotland Street, was published in book form to great acclaim in 2005; the ninth book in the series, Bertie’s Guide to Life & Mothers, is due in February 2015. Corduroy Mansions, a series depicting the lives of the inhabitants of a large Pimlico house, was printed and podcast by the UK’s Daily Telegraph, and is now published in three volumes. In addition, McCall Smith’s German professor series, beginning with Portuguese Irregular Verbs, now has four volumes, including Unusual Uses for Olive Oil (January 2013).

 

McCall Smith’s modern retelling of Jane Austen’s Emma was published in April 2015. He has writ­ten three solo novels, La’s Orchestra Saves the World (2009), Trains and Lovers (2013), and The Forever Girl (2014). His e-book original, Fatty O’Leary’s Dinner Party was available in August 2014. A non-fiction book about W. H. Auden entitled, What W. H. Auden Can Do for You was published in September 2013. He is also the author of several children’s books, including a mystery series about Precious Ramotswe as a young girl, the Akimbo series, about a boy in Africa, the Harriet Bean series, the Max & Maddy series, and The Perfect Hamburger and other Delicious Stories. Pantheon has also published Alexander McCall Smith’s collection of African folktales, The Girl Who Married a Lion. In addition to his novels, he has written libretti for two operas, The Okavango Macbeth – the trag­edy as played out by a troop of baboons, and Blunt, a story based on the life of the spy, Anthony Blunt.

 

McCall Smith was born in what is now Zimbabwe and was educated there and in Scotland. He became a law professor in Scotland, and it was in this role that he first returned to Africa to work in Botswana, where he helped to set up a new law school at the University of Botswana. For many years he was Professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh, and has been a visiting professor at a number of other universities elsewhere, including ones in Italy and the United States. He is now a Professor Emeritus at the University of Edinburgh.

 

In addition to his university work, McCall Smith was for four years the vice-chairman of the Human Genetics Commission of the UK, the chairman of the British Medical Journal Ethics Committee, and a member of the International Bioethics Commission of UNESCO. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including The Crime Writers’ Association’s Dagger in the Library Award, the United Kingdom’s Author of The Year Award in 2004, the Saga Award for Wit, and Sweden’s Martin Beck Award. In 2007 he was made a CBE for his services to literature in the Queen’s New Year’s Honor List. He holds honorary doctorates from 12 universities, most recently from Southern Methodist University, Dallas. In 2010 McCall Smith was awarded the Presidential Order of Merit by the President of Botswana.

 

Alexander McCall Smith currently lives in Edinburgh with his wife Elizabeth (an Edinburgh doctor). His hobbies include playing wind instruments, and he is the co-founder of an amateur orchestra called “The Really Terrible Orchestra” in which he plays the bassoon and his wife plays the horn.