“In Smith’s delightful third mystery featuring Malmö, Sweden, an art historian wants Ulf Varg, the thoughtful, tolerant head of the Department of Sensitive Crimes, to catch the person trying to besmirch his reputation. The gossamer-thin plot is almost irrelevant. The novel’s pleasures lie in Ulf’s philosophical asides and comments on how to live a good, just life . . . Smith’s gift is to use crime as a structure for writing about morality and making it such a pleasure to read. This is a refreshing change from the standard Scandinavian noir fare.”
—Publishers Weekly
“[T]he Detective Varg series is about a branch of the Swedish Police, based in Malmö, and dedicated to the investigation of highly unusual crimes—ones that may seem miniscule, even comic, except to the victims. Detective Ulf Varg is a delight to follow as he muses on a wide range of topics, including his own conflicted, self-critical character. What appears, at first, to be a “nothing” series of crimes expands into an incisive character analysis with a “wow” of a resolution, all while sustaining its comic bent. The Varg series is a nice antidote to Nordic noir.”
—Booklist [starred review]
“The Man with the Silver Saab is a crime novel, but one very different from today’s fashionable crime fiction. It is a long way from the blood-spattered “tartan noir” or the equally sanguinary Nordic variety . . . But though McCall Smith’s hero Ulf Varg is a policeman, the department he heads deals with “Sensitive Crimes.” Ulf’s investigation is quiet but persistent. You feel they will get there in the end, and that the end will be only a little surprising. Ulf behaves with the characteristic decency of McCall Smith’s main characters . . . The nature and importance of friendship and love are two of the themes which recur in all his work. The world is to be enjoyed but there are times it can only be endured. How true; McCall Smith is a spokesman for out-of-fashion virtues; therefore a writer of some real importance.”
—The Scotsman
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