Christopher Brookmyre

“This is Glesca.... Any time you're confused, take a wee minute to remind yourself of that inescapable fact: this is Glesca. We don't do subtle, we don't do nuanced, we don't do conspiracy. We do pish-heid bampot bludgeoning his girlfriend to death in a fit of paranoid rage induced by forty-eight hours straight on the batter. We do coked-up neds jumping on a guy's heid outside a nightclub because he looked at them funny. We do drug-dealing gangster rockets shooting other drug-dealing gangster rockets as comeback for something almost identical a fortnight ago. We do bam-on-bam. We do tit-for-tat, score-settling, feuds, jealousy, petty revenge. We do straightforward. We do obvious. We do cannaemisswhodunit. When you hear hoofbeats on Sauchiehall Street, it's gaunny be a horse, no' a zebra...'.”

“Is it colour?’‘Oh yes.’‘You don’t let me down.You are my ambassador to pr0n, man.”

“3 people get stranded on a remote IslandA Banker, a Daily Mail reader & an Asylum seekerAll they have to eat is a box of 10 Mars bars The Banker says "Because of my expertise in asset management, I''ll look after our resources"The other 2 agreeSo the Banker opens the box, gobbles down 9 of the Mars bars and hands the last one to the Daily Mail readerHe then says " I'd keep an eye on that Asylum seeker, he's after your Mars Bar”

“And what is it with these fucking people and teenage virgins anyway? Have they ever actually shagged one? I have, more than once, and none of the encounters would appear on my list of sexual highlights.”

“He checks the horns. They're small: not truncated like Hellboy's, but wee, budding, trainer-bra efforts. Definitely not the thing that killed Dazza. In demon terms, he's looking at a midget or a waen. He recalls the ten second rule, and though they only clashed for a moment, it was more than enough. He understands. He has the measure. There is no paralysis by fear. There will be no subconscious surrender to superior mental force and aggression. In short, he can take this cunt.”

“People didn't really like McDonald's, same as her mum didn't really like Catholicism, but when you were new in town, at least it was a known quantity. So that'll be a Quarter-Pounder and a Communion Wafer meal-deal to go.”

“Just because you disagreed with the Poll Tax and detested Margaret Thatcher—""Detest is a little inappropriate," Parlabane said. "Maybe closer to say I spent the entire Eighties wishing I was pissing on her rotting corpse.”

“Parlabane found the word 'pro-active' enormously useful, as it immediately exposed the speaker as an irredeemable arsehole, whatever previous impression might have been given. Once upon a time, he remembered, people and companies just did things. But that ceased to be impressive enough, and for a while they 'actively' did things. Now they 'pro-actively' did things, but it was still the same bloody things that they were doing when they just plain old did things. Meaningless wank-language.”

“Non è che siamo degli emarginati, è che abbiamo imparato cos'è che non ci serve.”

“... ci sono errori che fin dall'inizio sai di dover commettere, di voler commettere, a dispetto di cosa ti dica la coscienza, la logica o la paura”

“Was there anything quite so under-rated in this shallow, plastic, global-corporate, tall-skinny-late, kiddy-meal-and-free-toy, united-colours-of-fuck-you-too world, than a good old-fashioned, no-frills, retail blow-job?”

“Is the burden of independent thought wearing you down? Do you dread the indecision that awaits every time you open your wardrobe? Are you embarrassed by your reticence when you hear other people discuss current affairs, music, relationships, etcetera? Don't worry, you're not alone. Help is just a pair of clippers away! We've helped thousands of sad losers avoid confronting their loneliness and inadequacy, and we can do the same for you. We'll tell you what to wear. We'll tell you what to think. We'll tell you what music to listen to. and most importantly, we'll bring you together with lots of people exactly the same as yourself — it's just like having friends!”

“Just for a while": Death's opening chat-up line in His great seduction, before he drugged you with soporific comforts, distracted you with minor luxuries and ensnared you with long-term payment plans.Join the Rat Race "just for a while."Concentrate on your career "just for a while."Move in with your girlfriend "just for a while."Find a bigger place, out in the burbs "just for a while."Lie down in that wooden box "just for a while.”

“Well, are you not going to give the man a round of applause?" he asked. "I mean, that was fucking amazing, didn't you think? Honestly, if you'd asked me ten minutes ago, hypothetically, if it was possible to cut your own head off, I'd have said unequivocally no. You've really got to hand it to the bloke -- though it's fair to say luck was involved. I mean, there's no way he could do it again.”

“Truth was, if you were going to believe something, it was best to believe in stuff that made the world seem a more interesting place.”

“Art and savagery, aesthetics and violence. Were they contradictory or symbiotic?”