You can go through life and make new friends every year - every month practically - but there was never any substitute… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“She knew that for many people this was their greatest ambition: to have a partner and a child, to live the domestic… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“We should all have a tree in our childhood...a tree one might explore, a tree from which one might learn how to… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“There were many suggestions as to improvements: the addition of a window here and a door there, the insertion of an extra… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“You say that you lost your child. You know how I feel then. You know that, don't you? It's a sadness that… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
To lose a child ... was something that could end one's world. One could never get back to how it was before.… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Those images of those old places, the places you come from, never completely disappear. They remain with you, those scraps of memory;… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“We assume so much, don’t we? We assume that our children are going to be reasonable. We assume they’re going to see… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Matthew knew that phrenology was nonsense, and yet, years later, he found himself making judgments similar to those made by his father;… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
Daughters could survive a powerful mother, but boys found it almost impossible. Such boys were often severely damaged and spent the rest… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Love is nothing out of the ordinary, even if we think it is; even if we idealise it, celebrate it in poetry,… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Mma Ramotswe had been understanding. Men who sired children and then failed to accept responsibility for them were anathema to her, and… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Inside every one of us, thought Mma Ramotswe, there is the child we once were, the child that was unsure about the… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“But then she reminded herself that there were plenty of people who were afraid of the police, even if they had clear… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“substitute for those friendships of childhood that survive into adult years. Those are the ones in which we are bound to one” — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“You cannot divide a child's heart in two" she had observed to Mma Makutsi, "and yet that is what some people wish… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
I've also long since realized that the way to really engage children is to give out prizes; it's amazing how it concentrates… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Teachers were not allowed to beat children as they did in the past, although, Mma Ramotswe reflected, there were some boys-and indeed… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Nobody went to bed at seven in Paris, even French children. Les enfants stayed up late at night, he had heard, eating… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“She was thinking of Mobile, where her mother—her “sainted American mother,” as she called her—had spent her childhood. That was a place… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“old-fashioned, gentle Scottish physician, unmoved by the considerations of profit and personal gain that could so disfigure medicine. That doctors should consider themselves businessmen… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“She had not made a lot of money, but she had not made a loss, and she had been happy and entertained. That counted… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
And that, in a way, was the burden of being a philosopher: one knew what one had to do, but it was so often… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“To use strong language, she thought, was a sign of bad temper and lack of concern for others. Such people were not clever or… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Men are very sensitive, Mma Makutsi. You would not always think it to look at them, but they are. They do not like you… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“He is a good man, but even a good man can fall for a glamorous woman. That is well known.” “That is very well… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“And then the second thing you have to do is go and see your son. That is a duty of love, Andrew. It's as… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Because laughs never die away entirely,” said Jamie. “At least, if you believe in Marconi.” — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“The trouble with having a conscience, she said to herself, is that it never sleeps.” — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“And if there's bad behaviour," Mma Potokwane went on. "If there's bad behaviour, the quickest way of stopping it is to give more love.… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
“Has he not got a wife back wherever he comes from? Is there no wife to say, ‘You must not go off and visit… — Alexander McCall Smith Copy Share Image
