Philip Kerr

“I made an appointment to see him and then ordered another beer. While I was drinking it I did some doodling on a piece of paper, the algebraic kind that you hope will help you think more clearly. When I finished doing that, I was more confused than ever. Algebra was never my strong subject.”

“Looking round the room I found there were so many false eyelashes flapping at me that I was beginning to feel a draught.”

“When you get a cat to catch the mice in your kitchen, you can't expect it to ignore the rats in the cellar.”

“He was as obsequious as a Japanese ivy plant. Wringing his hands as if he hoped to squeeze the milk of human kindness from his fingernails, ...”

“A man's bookseller should keep his confidence, like his physician. What can become of a world where every man knows what another man reads? Why, sir, books would become like quacks' potions, with every mountebank in the newspapers claiming one volume's superiority over another.”