Quotes from Ben Aaronovitch

The Metropolitan Police Service is still, despite what people think, a working-class organisation and as such rejects totally the notion of an officer class. That is why every newly minted constable, regardless of their educational background, has to spend a two-year probationary period as an ordinary plod on the streets. This is because nothing builds character like being abused, spat at and vomited by members of the public.

If you ask any police officer what the worst part of the job is, they will always say breaking bad news to relatives, but this is not the truth. The worst part is staying in the room after you've broken the news, so that you're forced to be there when someone's life disintegrates around them. Some people say it doesn't bother them - such people are not to be trusted.

Don't ask me why I know what an Edwardian smoking jacket looks like: let's just say it has something to do with Doctor Who and leave it at that.

But . . ." Dominic floundered around for a bit before pointing at me accusingly. "You said that there's weird shit, but it normally turns out to have a rational explanation." "It does," said Beverley. "The explanation is a wizard did it.

We were aiming for a cross between Kafka and Orwell, which just goes to show how dangerous it can be when your police officers are better read than you are.

First law of gossip - there's no point knowing something if somebody else doesn't know you know it.

It's a truism in policing that witnesses and statements are fine, but nothing beats empirical physical evidence. Actually it isn't a truism because most policemen think the word 'empirical' is something to do with Darth Vader, but it damn well should be.

On the plus side, there were no rioters in sight but on the minus side this was probably because everywhere I looked was on fire.

Keep breathing,' I said. 'It's a habit you don't want to break.

I wasn't sure I found that particularly reassuring, but in the event of an attack I wasn't going to be as much use as Thomas 'Oh sorry, was that your Tiger Tank?' Nightingale.

Not being invited in is one of the boxes on the "suspicious behavior" bingo form that every copper carries around in their head along with "stupidly overpowerful dog" and being too quick to supply an alibi. Fill all the boxes and you too could win an all-­expenses-paid visit to your local police station.

Zap,' I said. 'That's the technical term for it, is it? What do you call someone who's been zapped?' 'Mr. Crispy,' said Kumar.

I looked into the literature on this," said Nightingale, "and it wasn't very helpful." "There's a literature about this?" "You'd be amazed, Constable, about what there's a literature on.

Like young men from the dawn of time, I decided to choose the risk of death over certain humiliation.

I was tempted to tell her it was because we were British and actually had a sense of humour, but I try not to be cruel to foreigners, especially when they're that strung out.

He was calling it an atonic seizure because, even if he didn't know why it had happened, it was important to give it a cool name.

I left in a hurry before he could change his mind, but I want to make it clear that at no point did I break into a skip

I have an idea," I said. "This better not be a cunning plan," said Leslie. Nightingale looked blank, but at least it got a chuckle from Dr Walid.

My mum translated this in her head to "witchfinder," which was good because like most West Africans, she considered witchfinding a more respectable profession than policeman.

As soon as we stopped sleeping with our cousins and build walls, temples and a few decent nightclubs, society became too complex for any one person to grasp all at once, and thus bureaucracy was born. A bureaucracy breaks the complexity down into a series of interlocking systems. You don't need to know how the systems fit together, or even what function your bit of the system has, you just perform your bit and the whole machine creaks on.

As I stepped onto the gloomy landing a word formed in my mind: two syllables, starts with a V and rhymes with dire. I froze in place. Nightingale said that everything was true, after a fashion, and that had to include vampires, didn't it? I doubted they were anything like they were in books and on TV, and one thing was for certain — they absolutely weren't going to sparkle in the sunlight.

good-Samaritanism in London is considered an extreme sport - like base-jumping or crocodile-wrestling.

In some households you only have to turn up three times before you're expected to make your own tea, draw up a chair in front of the telly and call the cat a bastard.

Hyde Park Corner is what happens when a bunch of urban planners take one look at the grinding circle of gridlock that surrounds the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and think—that's what we want for our town.