Feet of Clay (Discworld, #19; City Watch, #3)

by Terry Pratchett

At least, that small part of it which as a human she’d thought of as “vision” was monochrome—but who cared that vision had to take a back seat when smell drove instead, laughing and sticking its arm out of the window and making rude gestures at all the other senses? Afterward, she always remembered the odors as colors and sounds. Blood was rich brown and deep brass, stale bread was a surprisingly tinkly bright blue, and every human being was a four-dimensional kaleidoscopic symphony. For nasal vision meant seeing through time as well as space: man could stand still for a minute and, an hour later, there he’d still be, to the nose, his odors barely faded.

Scent odor smell

Royalty was like dandelions. No matter how many heads you chopped off, the roots were still there underground, waiting to spring up again.

Whoever had created humanity had left in a major design flaw. It was its tendency to bend at the knees.

a faded copy of Twurp’s Peerage or, as he personally thought of it, the guide to the criminal classes. You wouldn’t find slum-dwellers in these pages, but you would find their landlords. And, while it was regarded as pretty good evidence of criminality to be living in a slum, for some reason owning a whole street of them merely got you invited to the very best social occasions.

It was easy enough to imagine an ennobled Nobbs. Because where Nobby went wrong was in thinking small. He sidled into places and pinched things that weren’t worth much. If only he’d sidled into continents and stolen entire cities, slaughtering many of the inhabitants in the process, he’d have been a pillar of the community.

He needs to drink but he doesn’t dare to these days. You know: one drink is too many, two is not enough

the thing about things that were stolen was that the bloody things weren’t there.

although trained canines as aids for those bereft of sight, and even of hearing, have frequently been used throughout the universe, Foul Ole Ron was the first person ever to own a Thinking-Brain Dog.

“We’re all lyin’ in the gutter, Fred. But some of us’re lookin’ at the stars .

Apartment houses round here made up for their limited number of rooms by having a large number of people occupy them.

Not Thou Shalt Not. Say I Will Not.

“Commander, I always used to consider that you had a definite anti-authoritarian streak in you.” “Sir?” “It seems that you have managed to retain this even though you are Authority.” “Sir?” “That’s practically Zen.” “Sir?”

Law Is The Servant of Freedom. Freedom Without Limits Is Just A Word,” said Dorfl ponderously.

Sounds like an anarchist to me!