Top 100 Ben Aaronovitch Quotes
#1. The rise and fall of Teresa Cornelys proves three things: that the wages of sin are high, that you should "just say no" to opera, and that it's always wise to diversify your investment portfolio.
Ben Aaronovitch
#2. I think it's designed to flower open like a Chocolate Orange."
Me and Lesley then had to explain Terry's Chocolate Orange to Nightingale.
"Not unlike a practitioner's hand opening to reveal a werelight," said Nightingale.
"Not unlike at all," I said. Yeah, exactly like that I thought.
Ben Aaronovitch
#3. It was a good plan, and like all plans since the dawn of time, this would fail to survive contact with real life.
Ben Aaronovitch
#4. Zach looked at Carey in consternation, obviously wondering if we were using the rare good cop/loony cop interrogation technique.
Ben Aaronovitch
#6. I saw a dark void under the platform and had just enough time to think: Fuck me he's a earthbender.
Ben Aaronovitch
#7. What's it a charm for?' she asked.
The man thought about this for a moment.
'It's your basic all-enveloping protection charm,' he said, his hands describing a cupped circle in the air. 'For protection against ... '
'Envelopes?' said Abigail.
Ben Aaronovitch
#8. I gave the prescribed Metropolitan Police "first greeting".
"Oi!" I said "What do you think you're doing?
Ben Aaronovitch
#9. You have to call me Master." "Master?" "That's the tradition," said Nightingale. I said the word in my head and it kept on coming out massa.
Ben Aaronovitch
#10. Fish and chip night was a Kumar family tradition that dated back to when Jaget was courting his wife and they used to meet in the last white English-owned fish and chip shop in Wembley on the basis that none of their relatives would go in there. "It
Ben Aaronovitch
#11. This is where the whole ape-descended thing reveals its worth, I thought madly. Sucks to be you, quadruped. Opposable thumbs - don't leave home without them.
Ben Aaronovitch
#13. ( ... ) I headed over the river to the address listed on Mr Wilkinson's driving licence to see whether there was anyone who loved him enough to kill him.
Ben Aaronovitch
#14. Officially she was there to liaise with me on the case, but really she was there for the wide-screen TV, takeaways and the unresolved sexual tension.
Ben Aaronovitch
#15. My Dad says that being a Londoner has nothing to do with where you're born. He says that there are people who get off a jumbo jet at Heathrow, go through immigration waving any kind of passport, hop on the tube and by the time the train's pulled into Piccadilly Circus they've become a Londoner.
Ben Aaronovitch
#16. Boss,' I said into my Airwave. 'It's getting needlessly metaphysical out here.
Ben Aaronovitch
#17. There's nothing quite like Latin for disguising the fact that you're making it up as you go along.
Ben Aaronovitch
#18. He was from Yorkshire, or somewhere like that, and like many Northerners with issues, he'd moved to London as a cheap alternative to psychotherapy.
Ben Aaronovitch
#19. I have an idea," I said.
"This better not be a cunning plan," said Leslie.
Nightingale looked blank, but at least it got a chuckle from Dr Walid.
Ben Aaronovitch
#20. Ghosts, I was thinking, memories - I wasn't sure there was a difference.
Ben Aaronovitch
#21. I took the swab using the collection kit that I'd borrowed from Dominic who, I realized, had left the Boy Scout scale behind and was now verging on Batman levels of crazy preparedness.
Ben Aaronovitch
#22. Every male in the world thinks he's an excellent driver. Every copper who's ever had to pick an eyeball out of a puddle knows that most of them are kidding themselves.
Ben Aaronovitch
#23. Like young men from the dawn of time, I decided to choose the risk of death over certain humiliation.
Ben Aaronovitch
#24. My dad was a fairy," said Zach. "And by that I don't mean he dressed well and enjoyed musical theatre.
Ben Aaronovitch
#25. Holy paranormal activity, Nightingale - to the Jag mobile.
Ben Aaronovitch
#26. In the 1960s the planning department of the London County Council, whose unofficial motto was Finishing What the Luftwaffe Started, decided that what London really needed was a series of orbital motorways driven through its heart.
Ben Aaronovitch
#27. You shouldn't make jokes about these things," she said. "Science doesn't have all the answers, you know."
"It's got all the best questions, though,
Ben Aaronovitch
#29. Pictures of Cheam adorn the walls of planning offices of every Home County to serve as an awful warning.
Ben Aaronovitch
#30. We stopped and listened. Just on the cusp of hearing I detected a rhythmic pounding, more a vibration in the concrete than a sound.
'Drums,' I said and then because I couldn't resist it. 'Drums in the deep.'
'Drum and Bass in the deep,' said Kumar.
Ben Aaronovitch
#31. The first rule about a black woman's hair is you don't talk about a black woman's hair. And the second rule is you don't ever touch a black woman's hair without getting written permission first.
Ben Aaronovitch
#32. Even in these days of eBay and superencrypted anonymous purchasing over the Internet, the safest way to buy stolen stuff is to meet a total stranger and hand over a wedge of untraceable cash. They don't know you, you don't know them - the only problem is where to meet.
Ben Aaronovitch
#33. What are my options?" she asked as I climbed into the driver's seat. "Meaningless euphemisms at one end and your full-on Unseen University at the other," I said. "The Unseen University is a bit like Hogwart's - " Stephanopoulos cut me off. "I have read some Terry Pratchett," she said.
Ben Aaronovitch
#34. Somebody doesn't know they're not in Kansas anymore,' said Stephanopoulos.
Ben Aaronovitch
#35. As Conan the Barbarian famously said, That which does not kill us does not kill us.
Ben Aaronovitch
#36. One Hyde Park squatted next to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel like a stack of office furniture, and with all the elegance and charm of the inside of a photocopier. Albeit a brand new photocopier that doubled as a fax and document scanner.
Ben Aaronovitch
#37. I may be a city boy, but I'm fairly certain that the greasy purple and red squishy bits are supposed to stay inside the sheep and not be sprayed across a surprisingly large area.
"Animal attack?" I asked.
Ben Aaronovitch
#38. insouciance. But there's just something uniquely intimidating about
Ben Aaronovitch
#39. Blackstone's Police Operational Handbook recommends the ABC of serious investigation: Assume nothing, Believe nothing, and Check everything.
Ben Aaronovitch
#40. When you're a boy your life can be measured out as a series of uncomfortable conversations reluctantly initiated by adults in an effort to tell you things that you either already know or really don't want to know.
Ben Aaronovitch
#41. If you find yourself talking to the police, my advice is to stay calm but look guilty; it's your safest bet.
Ben Aaronovitch
#42. In the winter she curls up around a good book and dreams away the cold.
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#43. He threw a fireball at me. I threw a chimney stack at him - that's the London way.
Ben Aaronovitch
#44. Are there rules?'
'No gods, no staffs, first man to stay down for the count loses and we suspend the contest if the building collapses.'
- on magical duels
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#46. We'd considered wearing uniform but Lesley said, what with her mask and everything, she'd look like a plastic cop monster from Doctor Who. I managed to restrain myself from telling her their real name.
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#47. The white boys knew they had my attention now, but hesitated
that's the trouble with being a racist in the white heartlands, you don't get a lot of practical experience.
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#49. Because who is more oppressed," exclaimed Leslie. "Those that seek nothing but entitlements for themselves or those that claim for everything, social security, housing benefit, disability and pay for nothing." One
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#50. Was it better to die in the illusion of sunshine and warmth or face death in a cold darkness of reality? Was it better to die in happy ignorance or terrified knowledge? The answer, if you're a Londoner, is that it's better not to die at all.
Ben Aaronovitch
#51. I looked into the literature on this," said Nightingale, "and it wasn't very helpful."
"There's a literature about this?"
"You'd be amazed, Constable, about what there's a literature on.
Ben Aaronovitch
#52. So that's when I came up with the most ridiculous plan since I'd decided to take a witness statement from a ghost. It was a plan so stupid that even Baldrick would have rejected it out of hand.
Ben Aaronovitch
#53. Vikings," said Lesley. "Precisely," said Nightingale. "Bloodthirsty, but surprisingly erudite in a limited fashion." Well
Ben Aaronovitch
#54. I was tempted to tell her it was because we were British and actually had a sense of humour, but I try not to be cruel to foreigners, especially when they're that strung out.
Ben Aaronovitch
#55. A London copper doesn't like to intrude upon a traveller camp with anything less than a van full of bodies in riot gear - it's considered disrespectful otherwise.
Ben Aaronovitch
#56. Keep breathing,' I said. 'It's a habit you don't want to break.
Ben Aaronovitch
#57. It's strictly constables, sergeants, and lunatics. We'll keep the kettle on for you.
Ben Aaronovitch
#58. People don't like to speak ill of the dead even when they're monsters, let alone when they're loved ones. People like to forget any bad things that someone did and why should they remember?
Ben Aaronovitch
#59. Despite what you think you know, most people don't want to fight, especially when evenly matched. ... That's why you see those pissed young men doing the dance of "don't hold me back" while desperately hoping someone likes them enough to hold them back.
Ben Aaronovitch
#60. Why would a young man like you be interested in history?"
"So I can avoid repeating it."
"Then stay away from men who talk about the fatherland," he said. "That's my advice.
Ben Aaronovitch
#61. Zap,' I said. 'That's the technical term for it, is it? What do you call someone who's been zapped?'
'Mr. Crispy,' said Kumar.
Ben Aaronovitch
#62. Abigail stared suspiciously at Lesley. "Why are you wearing a mask?" she asked.
"Because my face fell off," said Lesley.
Abigail considered this for a moment and then nodded. "Okay," she said.
Ben Aaronovitch
#64. A romantic," said Nightingale much, much later. "The most dangerous people on Earth.
Ben Aaronovitch
#65. I don't mind getting drunk, but there always comes a moment in the evening when I find myself watching myself bumping into things and thinking - I'm bored of this, can I have full control of my brain back, please?
Ben Aaronovitch
#67. Conflict resolution,' said Nightingale. 'Is this what they teach at Hendon these days?'
'Yes, sir,' I said. 'But don't worry, they also teach us how to beat people with phone books and the ten best ways to plant evidence.
Ben Aaronovitch
#68. The British have always been madly overambitious, and from one angle it can seem like bravery, but from another it looks suspiciously like a lack of foresight.
Ben Aaronovitch
#69. Which meant I spent my spare time learning theory, studying dead languages and reading books like Essays on The Metaphysical by John "never saw a polysyllabic word he didn't like" Cartwright.
Ben Aaronovitch
#70. Can you sacrifice people?' I asked. 'Take their magic that way?'
'Yes,' he said. 'But there's a catch.'
'What's the catch?'
'You get hunted down even unto the ends of the Earth and summarily executed.
Ben Aaronovitch
#71. Coffee arrived and the espresso was excellent, like an aromatic electric fence.
Ben Aaronovitch
#72. Jazz vampires,' said Stephanopoulos.
'I wish I hadn't started calling them that,' I said.
Ben Aaronovitch
#73. There was a list, Kimberley imagined, and in an obscure subsection of that list, a section that had not been properly updated since George Bush was President,
Ben Aaronovitch
#74. Your ghost,' she said, 'Nicholas Nickleby. Do you think he might still be at the crime scene?' 'How should I know?' I said. 'I don't even believe in ghosts.
Ben Aaronovitch
#75. Apparently after six days baking pigs and herding bricks, the inhabitants would kick back with a spot of cock-fighting, bullbaiting, and ratting. It was the sort of place an adventurous gentleman might venture only if he didn't mind being beaten, rolled, and catching an exciting venereal disease.
Ben Aaronovitch
#76. Udden attack of culture snobbery is a common affliction among policemen of a certain rank and age; it's like a normal midlife crisis only with more chandeliers and foreign languages.
Ben Aaronovitch
#77. We should tell forensics that the murder weapon may be archaeological," I said.
"Archaeological?" asked Seawoll.
"Could be," I said.
"Is that your professional opinion?"
"Yes.
Ben Aaronovitch
#78. Whatever was in the sandwiches, you didn't want them getting too warm and going off, or starting to smell, or spontaneously mutating into a new life form.
Ben Aaronovitch
#79. This is why magic is worse even than quantum physics. Because, while both spit in the eye of common sense, I've never yet had a Higgs bosun turn up and try to have a conversation with me.
Ben Aaronovitch
#80. Could it have been anyone, or was it destiny? When I'm considering this I find it helpful to quote the wisdom of my father, who once told me, Who knows why the fuck anything happens?
Ben Aaronovitch
#81. He was transparent, the way holograms in films are transparent.Three dimensional, definitely really there and fucking ... transparent.
Ben Aaronovitch
#82. He's been banned,' said Lesley. 'Until he passes the advanced driver's course.' 'Is that because you crashed that ambulance into the river?' asked Abigail.
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#83. I know it's hard, Peter," she'd said. "But if you could contain your erudition and ready wit for just a little while we'd be most grateful." "Am I allowed to be cheeky?" I'd asked. "No you're fucking not," said Seawoll. "I'm
Ben Aaronovitch
#84. This I know for a fact: the reason African women have children is so that there's someone else to do the housework.
Ben Aaronovitch
#85. I didn't tell him that it was all stored as binary information on rapidly spinning shiny discs, partly because I'd have to look up the details myself, but mostly because by the time he'd understood the technology it would have been replaced by something else.
Ben Aaronovitch
#86. For a certain generation of African immigrants cleaning offices became part of the culture like male circumcision and supporting Arsenal.
Ben Aaronovitch
#87. That's how real men settle their differences, through reasoned discussion and a dispassionate analysis. He farted as I reached the inner door, a sign, I decided, of his respect. Alexander
Ben Aaronovitch
#88. I've already told the police what happened, they didn't believe me. Why should you,' he said.
'Because we're the people that believe people that other people don't believe,' I said.
'How can I know that?' he asked.
'You're just going to have to believe me,' I said.
Ben Aaronovitch
#89. The bungalow was a hideous red-brick structure built, if I had to guess, in the early 1980s by some hack architect who'd been aiming at art deco and hit Tracy Emin instead.
Ben Aaronovitch
#90. Who made the 999 call?"
"Dunno," said Purdy. "Mobile, probably."
It's officers like Purdy that give the Metropolitan Police its sterling reputation for customer service that makes us the envy of the civilised world.
Ben Aaronovitch
#91. I, Anna Maria de Burgh Coppinger Isis solemnly swear on
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#92. He called it potentia because there's nothing quite like Latin for disguising the fact you're making it up as you go along.
Ben Aaronovitch
#93. I texted Nightingale to let him know our change in disposition and then I picked up my Pliny, because nothing says stuck all alone in your flat like a Roman know-it-all
Ben Aaronovitch
#94. The mark was from the glue that once held a folder into which a library card would have fitted back in the day when dinosaurs roamed the earth and computers were the size of washing machines.
Ben Aaronovitch
#95. There's more to life than just London," said Nightingale.
"People keep saying that," I said. "But I've never actually seen any proof.
Ben Aaronovitch
#96. If you overdo it, there are consequences.
What kind of consequences?
Strokes, brain hemorrhages, aneurysms ...
How do you know when you have overdone it?
When you have a stroke, brain hemorrhage or an aneurysm.
Ben Aaronovitch
#97. I think becoming a wizard is about discovering what's real and what isn't.
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#98. First law of gossip - there's no point knowing something if somebody else doesn't know you know it.
Ben Aaronovitch
#99. Seen something?" asked Nightingale, making me jump. "Jesus Christ," I said. "Not on this river," said Nightingale. "Not even Blake thought that was possible." We
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#100. But . . ." Dominic floundered around for a bit before pointing at me accusingly. "You said that there's weird shit, but it normally turns out to have a rational explanation."
"It does," said Beverley. "The explanation is a wizard did it.
Ben Aaronovitch
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