603 Quotes by Alexander McCall Smith

It is very difficult sometimes to keep upright.

There are many more kind people than not-so-kind people,” said Mma Ramotswe.

You do not have to read a book to understand how the world works. You just have to keep your eyes open.

And it was young men in red cars who were the most dangerous of all. Such people were best given a wide berth, both in and out of the car.

We find what we are looking for in life, her father had once said to her, which was true – if you look for happiness, you will see it; if you look for distrust and envy and hatred – all those things – you will find those too.

But we cannot always choose whose lives will become entangled with our own; these things happen to us, come to us uninvited, and Mma Ramotswe understood that well.

We like to think that we plan what happens to us, but it is chance, surely, that lies behind so many of the great events of our lives – the meeting with the person with whom we are destined to spend the rest of our days, the receiving of a piece of advice whic influences our choice of career, the spotting of a particular house for sale; all of these may be put down to pur chance, and yet they govern how our lives work out and how happy – or unhappy – we were going to be.

When you are with somebody you love the smallest, smallest things can be so important, so amusing because love transforms the world, everything. And was that what had happened?

The Morning After Coffee Bar was different from the mass-produced coffee bars that had mushroomed on every street almost everywhere, a development which presaged the flattening effects of globalisation; the spreading, under a cheerful banner, of a sameness that threatened to weaken and destroy all sense of place.