Great book. Equal doses of mystery, philosophy and story. 
 Some money quotes: 
 Army, Marriage, the Church, and Banking: the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Yes, go on, laugh.' 
 His presence was both funereal and incandescent, like a curse dressed in its Sunday best. 
 Fools talk, cowards are silent, wise men listen. 
 Years of teaching had left him with that firm and didactic tone of someone used to being heard, but not certain of being listened to. 
 'Books are mirrors: you only see in them what you already have inside you' 
 Statistics prove that more people die in bed than in the trenches. 
 While you're working, you don't have to look life in the eye. 
 'Making money isn't hard in itself,' he complained. 'What's hard is to earn it doing something worth devoting your life to.' 
 Does the madman know he is mad? Or are the madmen those who insist on convincing him of his unreason in order to safeguard their own idea of reality? 
 Destiny is usually just around the corner. Like a thief, a hooker, or a lottery vendor: its three most common personifications. But what destiny does not do is home visits. You have to go for it yourself.' 
 On being moronic Vs being evil: 
 'Moronic, which isn't quite the same thing. Evil presupposes a moral decision, intention, and some forethought. A moron or a lout, however, doesn't stop to think or reason. He acts on instinct, like an animal, convinced that he's doing good, that he's always right, and sanctimoniously proud to go around fucking up, if you'll excuse the French, anyone he perceives to be different from himself, be it because of skin colour, creed, language, nationality or... his leisure pursuits. What the world really needs are more thoroughly evil people and fewer borderline pigheads.' 
 On what women want: 
 As Freud tells us, women want the opposite of what they think or say they want, which, when you consider it, is not so bad, because men, as is more than evident, respond, contrariwise, to the dictates of their genital and digestive organs.