44 Scotland Street
(Book)

Residents of an Edinburgh apartment building are put merrily under the microscope in this latest offering from Scotsman McCall Smith. Likable 20-year-old Pat--now on her second ?gap? year--rents a room from Bruce, a handsome surveyor who is insufferably self-absorbed. He?s hardly boyfriend material, she tells herself, nor is Matthew, the aesthetically impaired owner of the gallery where she?s employed. Pat?s mundane life becomes infinitely more interesting when she suspects that one of the gallery?s paintings may be an undiscovered work of eighteenth-century portraitist Samuel Peploe. Fearful that a customer is also in on the secret, Pat hides the painting in her apartment, where it?s put to use by Bruce.