The Peppermint Tea Chronicles Quotes

“No words are necessary for love, Nor are words enough; Love that works its way unseen Into the fabric of all we do, Asks for no grounding Beyond a disposition of the heart, Which is the natural abode of love; For the heart is capable Of accommodating a hundred times Its volume of those things That are connected with love, And that mark, as milestones do, Our progress through life; For love is a thing Of many occasions, From the infant’s first embrace Of mother, to the unselfish love Of the philosopher for truth— These things are called love, These things are written within us, As natural as breathing, And as important—always there.”
― Alexander McCall Smith, The Peppermint Tea Chronicles

“We were, when all was said and done, children lost in the wood, and to break into tears was the most understandable of reactions, the most quintessentially human one too.”
― Alexander McCall Smith, The Peppermint Tea Chronicles

“Angus had little taste for the moral disaster that the public realm had become, and had come to the realisation that there was no essential merit in knowing what was going on in this fraught and distasteful arena. If he did not follow the parliamentary debates in the Scottish Parliament, did it make the slightest difference to anything? It did not, he decided. If he declined to read what the President of France had been up to, would this be noticed in Paris? Or anywhere else? He thought not. And so, in search of inner peace, he had instituted a new custom: on one day each week he would neither read a newspaper nor listen to the news on the radio, nor watch it on television. Isolated from the world of events, he would give his attention to the world itself; he would inhabit his moment and his place, rather than the fevered world reflected in the news. And with that detachment he was delighted to discover a sense of peace and resolution that in the normal course of events eluded him, and eluded, too, he suspected, many of those who were enmeshed in the world of current events. He”
― Alexander McCall Smith, The Peppermint Tea Chronicles

“There were good reasons to have a dog, but there were so many equally good reasons not to have one, and if people ever engaged in any calculation of benefit and convenience there would be no place for dogs in our lives. But that was not the way it was; people took on dogs out of love, without questioning whether it was the right time or the right place for love. Love simply took over and prompted one to act there and then. That was how dogs were taken into our lives; in that spirit of spontaneous affection, and not because we had considered and approved their case. Their case was messy and inconvenient and demanding—and yet we did it; we took on dogs, as Angus now did with this puppy on its lead and its two unrealistic young owners.”
― Alexander McCall Smith, The Peppermint Tea Chronicles

“Even Ulysses,” said Nicola. “Babies love Scotch Pies over in Glasgow. That’s what they feed them over there.” “Do they give them Irn Bru in their baby bottles?” asked Bertie. Nicola smiled. “Possibly, Bertie. They do a lot of things differently in Glasgow. It’s a city of great character.”
― Alexander McCall Smith, The Peppermint Tea Chronicles

“That investment had held its value, as had the other major asset in the aunt’s estate that now passed to Nicola—a small pie factory in Glasgow. This factory, formerly trading under the name Pies for Protestants Ltd but now called Inclusive Pies, employed no more than three people.”
― Alexander McCall Smith, The Peppermint Tea Chronicles