Sunday Philosophy Club (abridged)

Amateur sleuth Isabel Dalhousie is a philosopher who uses her training to solve unusual mysteries. She edits the Review of Applied Ethics, addressing such questions as "Truth telling in sexual relationships", and she also hosts The Sunday Philosophy Club at her house in Edinburgh. Behind the city's Georgian facades, its moral compasses are spinning with greed, dishonesty, and murderous intent.

In this second novel in the Sunday Philosophy Club, Isabel Dalhousie's niece, Cat (she of the unsuitable boyfriends) is invited to a wedding in Italy. This means that Isabel is left in charge of Cat's delicatessen: a task to which the redoutable moral philosopher proves more than equal. She is intrigued by the customers, of course, given her irrepressible tendency to take an interest in the business of others, and one man in particular attracts her attention.

Isabel's niece Cat is still worshipped by the young musician, Jamie, but Cat has a new and unsuitable love-interest. Meanwhile Isabel's Texan cousins have arrived in Edinburgh and are provoking a quite separate set of dilemmas. In between these events and complications, Edinburgh life continues, calmly sailed through by Isabel, her housekeeper, Grace, and, of course, that cautious resident of Isabel's garden, brother Fox. His alone is the uncomplicated existence.

For philosophically minded Isabel Dalhousie, editor of the Review of Applied Ethics, getting through life with a clear conscience requires careful thought. And with the arrival of baby Charlie, not to mention a passionate relationship with his father Jamie, 14 years her junior, Isabel enters deeper and rougher waters.

Isabel Dalhousie is a new mother and a connoisseur of philosophy; she'd rather not be a sleuth. But when a chance conversation at a dinner party draws Isabel into the case of a doctor whose career has been ruined, she cannot ignore what may be a miscarriage of justice. Because for Isabel ethics are not theoretical at all, but an everyday matter of life and death.

Isabel Dalhousie, philosopher and amateur solver of other people's problems, meets an old foe, Minty Auchterlonie, at a birthday party attended by their young children. Ambitious Minty, now the head of a small investment bank, is in trouble with her shareholders. Isabel becomes involved, and is drawn into a murky world of financial concealment.

Isabel Dalhousie, Edinburgh philosopher and curious observer of the behaviour of her fellow man, is approached by a friend at a local boarding school that is planning to appoint a new headmaster; an anonymous letter has arrived suggesting that one of the shortlisted candidates has a compromising past. But which one is it? Isabel is once again drawn into an investigation, and finds herself exploring dilemmas of human weakness and forgiveness.