307 Quotes by Alan Bradley

It is no longer enough simply to solve crimes: We modern private detectives must also be able to come up with catchy names for our cases.

Feigning stupidity was one of my specialties. If stupidity were theoretical physics, then I would be Albert Einstein.

A peculiar feeling passed over me – or, rather, through me, as if I were an umbrella remembering what it felt like to pop open in the rain.

Mirages of happiness, I thought. If you walk towards them, they will never grow any closer. Eventually they will vanish into thin air, like the Lady of the Lake.

I want to know who I am before it is too late – before I am no longer the same person – before I become someone different. Although there are days when this seems a furious race against time, there are others when it seems to matter not a tinker’s curse.

And in that instant I decided that I liked Mary, even if she didn’t like me. Anyone who knew the word slattern was worth cultivating as a friend.

Ned stuck out his calloused fingers and gave my hand a surprisingly gentle shake. It was like shaking hands with a pineapple.

As was your mother, you have been given the fatal gift of genius. Because of it, your life will not be an easy one – nor must you expect it to be. You must remember always that great gifts come at great cost.

Even after five hundred years?” “A seed is a remarkable vessel,” he told me. “Our one true time machine. Each of them is capable of bringing the past, alive, into the present. Think of that!