The collection / 60 fragments

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Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

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01Undated

Although it seems shocking to say so, grief is a funny thing. On the one hand, you're numb, yet on the other, something inside is trying desperately to claw its way back to normal: to pull a funny face, to leap out like a jack-in-the-box, to say "Smile, damn you, smile!

Alan Bradley / quote

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02Undated

Magic doesn’t work when you’re sad.

Alan Bradley / quote

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03Undated

I did not elaborate, nor did I need to. The human imagination is capable of anything when left on its own to fill in the blanks.

Alan Bradley / quote

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04Undated

The vicar's organized a snow-shoveling party.""But why?" I asked.It didn't make sense. If all the roads were closed, what use was it clearing a way to the front door?"Because," said Aunt Felicity's voice behind me, "it is a well-known fact that more than two men shut up together in an enclosed space for more than an hour constitute a hazard to society. If unpleasantness is to be avoided, they must be made to go outdoors and work off their animal spirits.

Alan Bradley / quote

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05Undated

Not to be too dramatic about it, that night I slept the sleep of the damned. I dreamt of turrets and craggy ledges where the windswept rain blew in from the ocean with the odor of violets. A pale woman in Elizabethan dress stood beside my bed and whispered in my ear that the bells would ring. An old salt in an oilcloth jacket sat atop a piling, mending nets with an awl, while far out at sea a tine aeroplane winged its way towards the setting sun.

Alan Bradley / quote

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06Undated

I dreamt of turrets and craggy ledges where the windswept rain blew in from the ocean with the odor of violets. A pale woman in Elizabethan dress stood beside my bed and whispered in my ear that the bells would ring. An old salt in an oilcloth jacket sat atop a piling, mending nets with an awl, while far out at sea a tiny aeroplane winged its way towards the setting sun.

Alan Bradley / quote

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07Undated

There's a lot to be said for being alone. But you and I know, don't we, Flavia, that being alone and being lonely are not at all the same thing?

Alan Bradley / quote

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08Undated

As Daffy once said, the best place to hide a glum countenance is onstage at the opera.

Alan Bradley / quote

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09Undated

How could I tell Clarence that finding another dead body was anything but dreadful? On the contrary: it was thrilling; it was exciting; it was exhilarating, it was invigorating; to say nothing of electrifying and above all, satisfying.How could I tell the dear man that murder made me feel so gloriously alive?

Alan Bradley / quote

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10Undated

It's amazing what the discovery of a corpse can do for one's spirits.

Alan Bradley / quote

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11Undated

The first thing they would do would be to open my mouth and extract the soggy ball of my handkerchief, and as they spread it out flat on the table beside my white remains, an orange stamp—a stamp belonging to the King—would flutter to the floor: It was like something right out of Agatha Christie.

Alan Bradley / quote

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12Undated

...silence is sometimes the most costly of commodities.

Alan Bradley / quote

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13Undated

There are choices in life which you are aware, even as you make them, cannot be undone; choices after which, once made, things will never be the same.There is that moment when you can still walk away, but if you do, you will never know what might have been.

Alan Bradley / quote

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14Undated

…because I was only eleven years old, I was wrapped in the best cloak of invisibility in the world.

Alan Bradley / quote

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15Undated

When you're that age, you sometimes have a great enthusiasm that is very deep and very narrow, and that is something that has always intrigued me-- that world of the eleven-year-old that is so quickly lost.

Alan Bradley / quote

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16Undated

The press was ruthless, but then so was the church.Flavia de Luce

Alan Bradley / quote

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17Undated

I had once repeated the experiment to reassure myself that this was so, and it was. Ashes to ashes; starch to sugar. A little window into the Creation

Alan Bradley / quote

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18Undated

I'm at that age where I watch such things with two minds, one that cackles at these capers and another that never gets much beyond a rather jaded and self-conscious smile, like the Mona Lisa.

Alan Bradley / quote

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19Undated

Love is love, wherever you may find it—even when it's covered in feathers.

Alan Bradley / quote

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20Undated

How very kind of her, ' I said. 'I must remember to send her a card.'I'd send her a card alright. It would be the Ace of Spades, and I'd mail it anonymously from somewhere other than Bishop's Lacey.

Alan Bradley / quote

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21Undated

I had found by experience that putting things down on paper helped to clear the mind in precisely the same way, as Mrs. Mullet had taught me, that an eggshell clarifies the consommé or the coffee, which, of course, is a simple matter of chemistry. The albumin contained in the eggshell has the property of collecting and binding the rubbish that floats in the dark liquid, which can then be removed and discarded in a single reeking clot: a perfect description of the writing process.

Alan Bradley / quote

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22Undated

The place smelled of commodes and playing cards, and before I was halfway to the end I had made a firm resolve never to begin to die. For me it would be all or nothing: no half measures, no lingering on the doorstep.

Alan Bradley / quote

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23Undated

A dead body is much more fascinating than a live one, and I have learned that most corpses tell better stories.

Alan Bradley / quote

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24Undated

Although it is pleasant to think about poison at any season, there is something special about Christmas, and I found myself grinning.

Alan Bradley / quote

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