1. Pg 3
In every working day there is a still moment, a point of balance; a fulcrum, if you like, around which the scales pivot. The slightest nudge at this point decides whether it’s going to be a good day or a bummer. It can come at any stage in the proceedings; it can be a mssive boot on your instep in the crowded rush-hour Tube, or a call from a rabid client at 5.29, just as you’re pulling your raincoat sleeve p your arm. It can be a fleeting wisp of a smile from the new girl in Accounts, the dismissal of a loathed superior, an unexpected and undeserved pay rise or a bluebottle floating in your mid-morning coffee. But it will come, every day, and leave its little scar.
2. Pg. 5
Click-buzz, said the phone. Duncan held it at arm’s length and scowled at it for a moment before putting it back. In many ways it reminded him of the former Mrs Hughes; every day he held it close to him, and every day it whispered in his ear horrible things that ruined his life.
3. Pg 28
Duncan Hughes adhered to the school of thought that maintains that you shouldn’t buy newspapers, because it only encourages them. Nevertheless, he had a guilty feeling that he really ought to keep up with current affairs, as a sort of miserable civic duty.
4. Pg 30
There is a moment, a watershed in one’s development as a human being, which must be passed before one has any claim to enlightenment and understanding. It’s the moment when you come to realise that, just because somebody likes you, you’re under no legal or moral obligation to like them back.
5. Pg 153
We’re lawyers. We know that the secret of attaining happiness lies in starting off with a realistically achievable definition. Only want what you know you can get.
6. Pg 402
Very few of the millions of people who hate their jobs ever get around to admitting it in so many unambiguous words, and of that small minority, only a fraction ever take it into their heads to do something about it.
Filed under: Books, Quotes
