This is my third adventure with Isabel Dalhousie after The Sunday Philosophy Club
and Friends, Lovers, Chocolate.
I found The Comfort of Saturdays at
the most orderly, spacious, and well-lit, bookstore that I’ve yet found in India (via some mall-walking in
Chennai). I try to read these in order, but I find that I’ve skipped a couple.
In one sense, this is quite alright because Isabel is Isabel, but she has
undergone some major changes in her life that give her even more to think about
and to act upon.
In this book, as well as the others, Isabel “meddles”, as she calls it.
Asked by someone to look into a situation, she dives in. As a detective (of
sorts) she arrives at seeming conclusions much too quickly. She’s often
surprised by wrong assumptions and conclusions, yet she wears her mistakes
lightly. I do wish that some of her philosophy training would have included
more on hypothesis formation and testing, probabilities, and the like. I’m
tempted to send her a copy of Sherlock Holmes and The Black Swan (Taleb). She’s too much Watson—but such a lovely
Watson. In addition to looking into whether a doctor has committed the misdeeds
he’s accused of, she has to deal with a contribution to her journal by an old
nemesis and her visceral dislike of a new acquaintance. The joy of McCall’s
writing is that he lets us share Isabel’s struggles to do the right thing. She
strives to think like a philosopher, but her instincts prompt her to act as a
human being, with all our foibles in the face of all the ambiguities that
the world presents to us.
Besides struggling with how the deal with the dislikes of her life, she
must also deal with her love life and the insecurities attendant to it. I
marvel at McCall’s ability to display this woman’s pride, intelligence, and
beauty (inner and outer), yet also her vulnerability and insecurity. Even
Isabel, who seems quite the rock in many instances, struggles with these
issues.
I’ll keep reading about Isabel Dalhousie because I like her company. That’s
no small compliment in my book.
Side Note: One of my other favorite series is set in Edinburgh, the John
Rebus novels of Ian Rankin. Dalhousie’s and Rankin’s experiences of the city
differ, to put it mildly. How would an “Isabel Dalhousie meets John Rebus”
novel work? Like “Bambi meets Godzilla”, I suspect. But together they do put
Edinburgh on my “to visit” map.
