Best known for his bestselling No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, Alexander McCall Smith is also the author of four other ongoing fiction series: Sunday Philosophy Club, Portuguese Irregular Verbs, 44 Scotland Street, and Corduroy Mansions. He has also written children's books, short stories, books on criminal law, and a textbook on law and medicine. His books have been published in forty-five languages. McCall Smith was born to Scottish parents in 1948 in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He studied law at the University of Edinburgh and returned to Africa to help establish the law school at the University of Botswana. He is currently a Professor Emeritus of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh.