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In 1666, following an unfortunate workplace accident, the city of London burnt down.
Ben Aaronovitch -
The world was different before the war. We didn't have this instantaneous access to information that your generation has. The world was a bigger, more mysterious place - we still dreamed of secret caves in the Mountains of the Moon, and tiger hunting in the Punjab.
Ben Aaronovitch
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We were suffering a standard gray London drizzle, the sort that makes it clear that it can keep it up all day if needs be.
Ben Aaronovitch -
Well, our victim had a thirst for knowledge. He was a student at St. Martins College.
Ben Aaronovitch -
Sometimes I wonder whether, if I’d been the one that went for coffee and not Lesley May, my life would have been much less interesting and certainly much less dangerous. 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?’ Covent
Ben Aaronovitch -
The main purpose of an administrative meeting is to establish collective guilt for whatever fuck-up arises out of its decisions.
Ben Aaronovitch -
What frustrated me was the thought that with three thousand years of history someone in China, some monk in a monastery halfway up a mountain, must have developed a magic kata, a physical expression of formae. Or at least have got close enough to explain all those legendary swordsmen and their inexplicable desire to roost on the tops of bamboo trees.
Ben Aaronovitch -
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
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Round and round and round we go and where we stop nobody knows.
Ben Aaronovitch -
I’m working on several theories,” I said. “But I’m currently favoring the hypothesis that the moon has a seemingly arbitrary effect on magic because it likes to piss me off.” “That’s a theory with a high degree of applicability to other spheres of life,” he said. “Yes it is,” I said, and we spontaneously fist
Ben Aaronovitch -
Here's a comforting thought for you, Peter,' he said. 'However long you may live, the world will never lose its ability to surprise you with its beauty.
Ben Aaronovitch -
He said it was wife’s idea to name their daughter after him but I didn’t believe him. Could have been worse, I decided. It could have been Nigella.
Ben Aaronovitch -
For a certain generation of African immigrants cleaning offices became part of the culture like male circumcision and supporting Arsenal.
Ben Aaronovitch -
In home furnishing terms, past a certain point, more money doesn’t get you anything except an increase in insurance premiums.
Ben Aaronovitch
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Coffee arrived and the espresso was excellent, like an aromatic electric fence.
Ben Aaronovitch -
If you find yourself talking to the police, my advice is to stay calm but look guilty; it's your safest bet.
Ben Aaronovitch -
But London didn’t care, she never does when you leave her because she knows for every one that leaves another two arrive. Besides, she was too busy painting on her neon lipstick and dolling herself up in red and gold.
Ben Aaronovitch -
I've already told the police what happened, they didn't believe me. Why should you.
Ben Aaronovitch -
Keep breathing. ‘It’s a habit you don’t want to break.
Ben Aaronovitch -
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
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Perhaps, I thought, the dead god gets folded into the existence of the new god, the way a dormant genetic variation can exist within an organism’s DNA—hanging about like an actor’s understudy until the right environmental conditions give it expression and—hey presto—suddenly a bacteria is heat resistant, our Chloe gets her big break on Broadway and a sniper for hire gets an unexpected half a meter of cold steel through the chest. Perhaps
Ben Aaronovitch -
I didn't ask why anybody would want to risk the electric two-step on the tracks because, as police, all three of us knew that there wasn't anything so stupid that somebody wouldn't try it sooner or later.
Ben Aaronovitch -
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 -
Most people don’t want to fight, especially when evenly matched. A mob will tear an individual to pieces and a man with a gun and a noble cause is happy to kill ever so many women and children, but risking a fair fight—not so easy. 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