M.C. Beaton > Quotes

“Snakes and bastards!”
― M. C. Beaton

“Clever plastic surgery can restore an appearance of youth, but nothing changes the expression of age and experience in the eyes.”
― M.C. Beaton, As the Pig Turns

“A lady is as young as the gentleman she feels," said Roy and cackled happily.”
― M.C. Beaton

“Ah, when love dies, women lose two and a half inches in height.”
― M.C. Beaton, Love, Lies and Liquor

“The other diners studied him with the polite frozen smiles the English use for threatening behaviour.”
― M.C. Beaton, The Quiche of Death

“Agatha had that old feeling of being on the outside of life looking in.”
― M.C. Beaton, The Potted Gardener

“Husbands are always angry,
that's their nature.
And the nature of us women,
is not to pay a blind bit of notice.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Scriptwriter

“Mrs. Wellington was wearing a voluminous flannel nightgown when she answered the door. Hamish was glad Mr. Wellington had found God, because it certainly looked as if he would need to wait until he got to heaven to get his reward.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Cad

“When confronted with someone who appears to be in a perpetual state of outrage, it is tempting for other people to wind them up. Besides, I have always found the most vociferous guardians of morality on matters of sex are those who aren’t getting any.”
― M.C. Beaton, Agatha Raisin and the Day the Floods Came

“Although she far outranked Hamish, she had to wait patiently, because this was Lochdubh, where Hamish Macbeth was king.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of an Addict

“Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps; for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are, and what they ought to be. —William Hazlitt”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Village

“How odd that people could be so ugly, not particularly because of appearence, but because of the atmosphere of judgemental bad temper and discontent they carried around with them”
― Beaton, M.C.

“Oh, really,” said Deborah brightly, “you don’t look like the sort of man who reads anything.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Glutton

“And being very young and capable of violent mood swings, she then began to worry about what to wear for dinner.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Gossip

“What’s gone, and what’s past help Should be past grief. —William Shakespeare”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Poison Pen

“Hamish’s family were unusual in that they had always celebrated Christmas—tree, turkey, presents and all. In parts of the Highlands, like Lochdubh, the old spirit of John Knox still wandered, blasting anyone with hellfire should they dare to celebrate this heathen festival. Hamish had often pointed out that none other than Luther was credited with the idea of the Christmas tree, having been struck by the sight of stars shining through the branches of an evergreen. But to no avail. Lochdubh lay silent and dark beside the black waters of the loch.”
― M.C. Beaton, A Highland Christmas

“They were obsessed, taken hostage, or co-dependent – anything rather than admit they were not in control, for the very word "love" now meant weakness.”
― M.C. Beaton, Agatha Raisin and the Terrible Tourist

“Good-bye healthy life and hullo rubber knickers and support hose?”
― M.C. Beaton, Agatha Raisin and the Love from Hell

“Look for me by moonlight; Watch for me by moonlight; I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way! —Alfred Noyes”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of an Honest Man

“You know, Mrs. Raisin, beauty is such a dangerous thing. It can slow character formation because people are always willing to credit the beautiful with character attributes they do not have.”
― M.C. Beaton, Agatha Raisin and the Case of the Curious Curate

“I wish I loved the Human Race; I wish I loved its silly face; I wish I liked the way it walks; I wish I liked the way it talks: And when I’m introduced to one I wish I thought What Jolly Fun! —Sir Walter A. Raleigh”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Nurse

“I am not in the mood to have my underwear examined.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Dustman

“We have no choice but to move forward," said Mrs. Bloxby. "That is how life works. We must live our lives looking forward, but we can only truly know ourselves by looking back. We are defined by everything that we have done in the past, but our only hope of change lies in the future.”
― M.C. Beaton, Beating About the Bush

“Christmas had done its usual merry work of setting husband against wife, relative against relative, and spreading bad will among men in general. People looked overfed and hung over and desperately worried about how much they had already spent.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Snob

“He fished steadily, trying to fight down a dragging, aching sense of loss, wondering how one’s brain should know all the sensible answers while one’s emotions longed for the unattainable.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Charming Man

“The breeze sent sunny ripples dancing across the sea loch. The village of Lochdubh in Sutherland looked like a picture postcard with its row of small eighteenth-century whitewashed cottages facing the sea loch. Hamish was leaning on the seawall, thinking dark thoughts about getting Charlie transferred back to Strathbane, that ghastly town full of drugs and crime.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Nurse

“like most thin-skinned people who have been snubbed, he could not leave the snubbers alone.”
― M.C. Beaton, Death of a Cad

“You look as if you’ve crawled out of a young offenders’ institute. Go upstairs and wash that muck off,”
― M.C. Beaton, Dishing the Dirt

“Agatha doubled her rates and then said, “Of course, I halve them for a friend.”
― M.C. Beaton, The Witches' Tree

“Bill and Alice were in the kitchen. Doris had served them coffee and biscuits. “Sit down, Agatha,” said Bill. “Of course I’m going to sit down,” said Agatha crossly. “It’s my own bloody house. I can sit on the damned chimney if I feel like it.”
― M.C. Beaton, As the Pig Turns