What are the motifs in Tears of the Giraffe by Alexander McCall Smith?

Good listening skills are a recurring idea through the book. This is important for a detective like Mma Ramotswe. She is able to talk to people and correctly deduce a lot about them and also able to learn a lot of small bits of information by making small talk. For example, consider her meeting with Mma Tsbago, the hitchhiker she picked up on her first trip to the farm. She accurately deduced that the woman worked at a shop in Bagorone and traveled to her village on the weekends to visit her children. Mma Tsbago provided her with an introduction to Mma Potsane who was at the farm when Michael Curtin disappeared.