Content Warning: This Important Quotes section discusses upsetting topics, including child sex trafficking, the commercial sexual exploitation of children, and physical abuse.

“[M]y stepfather looks at me the same

way he looks at the cucumbers I’m growing in front of our

hut. He flicks the ash from his cigarette and squints. ‘You had

better get a good price for them,’ he says.

When he looks, he sees cigarettes and rice beer, a new vest

for himself.

I see a tin roof.”

At the beginning of the novel, Lakshmi’s stepfather already views her as a way to make money, as evidenced by how he eyes her the same way he eyes their crops. This foreshadows how he later decides to sell her into the commercial sexual exploitation of children as soon as she gets her first period. However, Lakshmi also views herself as a way to make money, but has different and more responsible financial priorities than her stepfather, as well as different ideas about what are acceptable ways to make money.

“Now that Gita is gone, to work as a maid for a wealthy

woman in the city, her family has a tiny glass sun that hangs

from a wire in the middle of their ceiling, a new set of pots

for Gita’s mother, a pair of spectacles for her father, a

brocaded wedding dress for her older sister, and school

fees for her little brother.

Inside Gita’s hut, it is daytime at night.

But for me, it feels like nighttime even in the brightest sun

without my friend.”

The metaphor of a glass sun to describe a light shows Lakshmi’s lack of experience with electricity and other modern technologies, which results in extreme disorientation and culture shock when she eventually leaves her village. Also, this quote shows that although Lakshmi wants to go away and work to provide for her family, she also views this practice as problematic because it suggests that material goods and other luxuries are more important than having all of one’s children together and safe.