Moon Over Soho Quotes

For a terrifying moment I thought he was going to hug me, but fortunately we both remembered we were English just in time. Still, it was a close call.

The clever people at CERN are smashing particles together in the hope that Doctor Who will turn up and tell them to stop

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.

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.

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.

There's more to life than just London," said Nightingale. "People keep saying that," I said. "But I've never actually seen any proof.

We were aiming for a cross between Kafka and Orwell, which just goes to show how dangerous it can be when your police officers are better read than you are.

First law of gossip - there's no point knowing something if somebody else doesn't know you know it.

If you just warn people, they often simply ignore you. But if you ask them a question, then they have to think about it. And once they start to think about the consequences, they almost always calm down. Unless they're drunk, of course. Or stoned. Or aged between fourteen and twenty-one. Or Glaswegian.

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.

He was calling it an atonic seizure because, even if he didn't know why it had happened, it was important to give it a cool name.

It’s a truism in policing that witnesses and statements are fine, but nothing beats empirical physical evidence. Actually it isn’t a truism because most policemen think the word ‘empirical’ is something to do with Darth Vader, but it damn well should be.

Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, I thought. For they are soggy and hard to light.

It's a sad fact of modern life that if you drive long enough, sooner or later you must leave London behind.

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,

Blackstone's Police Operational Handbook recommends the ABC of serious investigation: Assume nothing, Believe nothing, and Check everything.

What's the biggest thing you've zapped with a fireball?' I asked. 'That would be a tiger,'said Nightingale. 'Well don't tell Greenpeace,' I said. 'They're an endagered species.' 'Not that sort of tiger,' said Nightingale. 'A Panzer-kampfwagen sechs Ausf E.' I stared at him. 'You knocked out a Tiger tank with a fireball?' 'Actually I knocked out two,' said Nightingale. 'I have to admit that the first one took three shots, one to disable the tracks, one through the driver's eye slot and one down the commander's hatch - brewed up rather nicely.

He threw a fireball at me. I threw a chimney stack at him - that's the London way.

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.

Ethically challenged magical practitioners,” I said.

I'd been too intent on the room to hear her coming up the stairs. Leslie said that the capacity not to notice a traditional Dutch folk dancing band walk up behind you was not a survival characteristic in the complex, fast-paced world of the modern policing environment. I'd like to point out that I was trying to give directions to a slightly deaf tourist at the time, and anyway it was a Swedish dance troupe.

one of the first rules of police work is that trouble will always come looking for you, so there’s no point looking for it.

Ghosts, I was thinking, memories - I wasn't sure there was a difference.

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.

The evening was still warm enough for shirtsleeves, and the city was clinging to summer like a wannabe trophy wife to a promising center forward.

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.

Sinister is Latin for 'left', making it the sort of enjoyable schoolboy pun that is such an advert for mixed-gender education.

(A)ny working hypothesis was probably going to involve quantum theory at some point—the part of physics that made my brains trickle out of my ears.

One thing for certain, Abigail who lived up the road was going on my watch list. In fact I was going to create a watch list just so I could put Abigail at the top of it.

Five hundred years ago the notoriously savvy Henry VIII discovered an elegant way to solve both his theological problems and his personal liquidity crisis - he dissolved the monasteries and nicked all their land. Since the principle of any rich person who wants to stay rich is, never give anything away unless you absolutely have to, the land has stayed with Crown ever since.

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.

Science doesn’t have all the answers, you know.” “It’s got all the best questions, though,” I said.

Jazz vampires,' said Stephanopoulos. 'I wish I hadn't started calling them that,' I said.

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?

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.

The bouncer scrutinized my face. “Do I know you?” he asked. No, I thought, but you might remember me from such Saturday-night hits as “Would you please put that punter down I’d like to arrest him,” “You can stop kicking him now, the ambulance has arrived,” and the classic “If you don’t back off right now I’m going to nick you as well.

But Smithy,” said Stephanopoulis. “I don’t believe in respectable businessmen. I’ve been a copper for more than five minutes. And the constable here doesn’t think you’re respectable either, because it happens he is a card-carrying member of the Workers’ Revolutionary Party and so regards all forms of property as a crime against the proletariat.” That one caught me by surprise and the best I could manage was “Power to the people.

Whatever you see, he’d said, take as long a look as you need to get used to it, to accept it, and then move on as if nothing has changed.

There’s more to life than just London,’ said Nightingale. ‘People keep saying that,’ I said. ‘But I’ve never actually seen any proof.

Dr Walid walked me past the security at reception and introduced me to today's dead body.

(...) 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.

Never diss somebody’s mum, never play chess with the Kurdish mafia, and never lie down with a woman who’s more magical than you are. I

An argument,” said Dr. Walid. “It’s an argument of wizards.

I showed her my warrant card, and she stared at it in confusion. You get that about half the time, mainly because most members of the public have never seen a warrant card close up and have no idea what the hell it is.

Murder investigations start with the victim, because usually in the first instance that's all you've got. The study of the victim is called victimology because everything sounds better with an 'ology' tacked on the end. To make sure you make a proper fist of this, the police have developed the world's most useless mnemonic - 5 x W H & H - otherwise known as Who? What? Where? When? Why? and How? Next time you watch a real murder investigation on the TV, and you see a group of serious-looking detectives standing around talking, remember that what they're actually doing is trying to work out what sodding order the mnemonic is supposed to go in. Once they've sorted that out, the exhausted officers will retire to the nearest watering hole for a drink and a bit of a breather.

The general public have a warped view of the speed at which an investigation proceeds. They like to imagine tense conversations going on behind the venetian blinds and unshaven, but ruggedly handsome, detectives working themselves with single-minded devotion into the bottle and marital breakdown. The truth is that at the end of the day, unless you've generated some sort of lead, you go home and get on with the important things in life - like drinking and sleeping, and if you're lucky, a relationship with the gender and sexual orientation of your choice.

If they were ugly, Peter, would you care half so much?" asked Nightingale. "There are some hideous things out there that can talk and reason, and I wonder if you would be quite so quick to rush to their defence." "Maybe not," I said. "But that just makes me shallow, it doesn't make me wrong.

Leslie said that the capacity not to notice a traditional Dutch folk-dancing band walk up behind you was not a survival characteristic in the complex fast-paced world of the modern policing environment. I’d like to point out that I was trying to give directions to a slightly deaf tourist at the time and anyway it was a Swedish dance troupe.

Lesley said that my exes knew that past a certain point I’d lost interest, and that’s why they always packed me in first. That’s not the way I remember it, but Lesley swore she could have constructed a calendar based on my love life. A cyclical one, she said, like the Maya – counting down to disaster. Lesley could be surprisingly erudite sometimes.

Men have died for this music. You can’t get more serious than that’ Dizzy Gillespie

For a terrifying moment I thought he was going to hug me. Fortunately, we both remembered we were English just in time. Still...it was a close call." ~ Peter Grant

Pictures of Cheam adorn the walls of planning offices of every Home County to serve as an awful warning.

People still use the phrase hoisted by his own petard

the clever people at CERN are smashing particles together in the hope that Doctor Who will turn up and tell them to stop.

but 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.

John Radcliffe, Royal physician to William and Mary, was famous in his own time for reading very little and writing almost nothing. So it stands to reason that one of the most famous libraries in Oxford was his creation.

You can’t die of jazz,” said Dr. Walid. “Can you?” I thought of Fats Navarro, Billie Holiday, and Charlie Parker who, when he died, was mistaken by a coroner for a man twice his real age. “You know,” I said, “I think you’ll find you can.” Jazz

The world was different before the war,' he said. '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.

but 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. And that includes after sex, marriage, or death for that matter. This courtesy is not reciprocated.

It was chintz but not the cat-lady chintz I was used to. Perhaps it was Mrs. Bellrush’s manner or steely blue eyes but I got the distinct impression that this was aggressive chintz, warrior chintz, the kind of chintz that had gone out to conquer an Empire and still had the good taste to dress for dinner. Any IKEA flat-pack that showed its face around here was going to be kindling.

Stephanopoulos was waiting for me inside. She was a short, terrifying woman whose legendary capacity for revenge had earned her the title of the lesbian officer least likely to have a flippant remark made about her sexual orientation. She was stocky, and had a square face that wasn’t helped by a Sheena Easton flat-top that you might have called ironic postmodern dyke chic, but only if you really craved suffering.

So etwas wie ein ständiges Spurensicherungsteam gibt es übrigens nicht. da die Spurensicherung so teuer ist, bestellt man sie beim Innenministerium immer nur häppchenweise wie beim chinesischen Lieferservice. Aus der prozession von Plastikanzügen zu schließen, die an uns vorüberzog, hatte Stephanopoulos sich das Super-Deluxe-Menü für sechs Personen mit einer extraportion Reis gegönnt. Und ich war dann wohl der Glückskeks.

The stairs down to the scene were so narrow that we had to wait for a herd of forensics types to come up before we could go down. There’s no such thing as a full-service forensics team. It’s very expensive, so you order bits of it up from the Home Office like a Chinese takeout. Judging by the number of noddy suits filing past us Stephanopoulis had gone for the super-deluxe meal for six with extra egg fried rice. I was, I guessed, the fortune cookie.

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.

Norwich station has your standard late-Victorian brick, cast-iron, and glass shed retrofitted with the bright molded plastic of various fast-food franchises. I gratefully staggered in the direction of Upper Crust and considered asking if I could stick my head under their coffee spigot but settled for a couple of double espressos and a chicken tikka masala baguette instead.

her hair was piled up under a broad-brimmed

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

Ghosts, I was thinking, memories – I wasn’t sure there was a difference.

we might have been Welsh, in my dad’s eyes a fate worse than Scottish.

studying dead languages and

The city was clinging to summer like a wannabe trophy wife to a promising center forward.

A little analytical voice in my head pointed out that any working hypothesis was probably going to involve quantum theory at some point – the part of physics that made my brain trickle out of my ears.

because everything sounds better with an ‘ology’ tacked on the end.

First law of gossip – there’s no point knowing something if somebody else doesn’t know you know it.

This is how you get out of bed the next day. You push off your duvet, rotate your body, put your feet on the floor and stand up. Then it’s have a wee, have a bath, get dressed, go downstairs, eat breakfast, talk to your boss, practise your forma, eat lunch, smack the shit out of the punchbag at the gym, shower, get dressed, get in the Ford Asbo and head into town to make sure that your face is being seen. You do this because it is your job, because it’s necessary and because, if you’re honest, you love it. Repeat this process until the bad dreams stop or you just get used to them – whichever comes first.

— Да, этого человека явно обучал профессионал, — нахмурился Найтингейл. — Вы себе представляете, сколько лет нужно тренироваться, чтобы достичь такого уровня? Какая нужна целеустремленность, какая требовательность к себе? Вы только что столкнулись с одним из самых опасных людей в мире. — Внезапно похлопав меня по плечу, он добавил: — И остались живы. Нет, это просто поразительно. На миг я испугался, что он собирается на радостях заключить меня в объятья, но, к счастью, мы оба вовремя вспомнили, что мы англичане. И все же момент был опасный.

He farted as I reached the inner door as a sign, I decided, of his respect. Alexander

Before London swallowed it whole, Camden Town was the fork in the road best known for a coaching inn called the Mother Red Cap. It served as a last-chance stop for beer, highway robbery and gonorrhoea before heading north into the wilds of Middlesex.

As property prices started rising, developers snatched up bomb sites and derelict buildings and erected the shapeless concrete lumps that have made the ’70s the shining beacon of architectural splendor that it is.

MUCH AS I love the Jag, it’s too conspicuous for everyday police work. So that day I was driving a battered silver ex–Metropolitan Police Ford Asbo that, despite my best efforts, smelled vaguely of old stakeouts and wet dog. I

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 Londoners. He said there were others, some of whom were born within the sound of the Bow Bells, who spend their whole life dreaming of an escape. When they do go, they almost always head for Norfolk where the skies are big, the land is flat, and the demographics are full of creamy-white goodness.

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.

IT’S A sad fact of modern life that if you drive long enough, sooner or later you must leave London behind.

The pianist, Daniel Hossack, was a classically trained music teacher at Westminster School for the terminally privileged.

You know,” he said, “when I first saw you I thought you were with the Thames girls, or a new sort of fae or something really outlandish like a witch doctor or an American.

I listened to make sure she wasn’t coming up the stairs and had a poke through the underwear drawers but got nothing except a vague sense of being really unprofessional.

The furniture looked like John Lewis – expensive, comfortable and unimaginative.

the planning department of the London County Council, whose unofficial motto was Finishing What the Luftwaffe Started,