Purple Hibiscus

"Things started to fall apart at home when my brother, Jaja, did not go to communion."

"I knew that when the tea burned my tongue, it burned Papas love into me."

"Kambili is right,’ she said. ‘Something from God was happening there.’"

"That night when I bathed, with a bucket half full of rainwater, I did not scrub my left hand, the hand that Father Amadi had held gently to slide the flower off my finger. I did not heat the water, either, because I was afraid that the heating coil would make the rainwater lose the scent of the sky. I sang as I bathed. There were more earthworms in the bathtub, and I left them alone, watching the water carry them and send them down the drain."

"The old silence had broken and left us with the sharp pieces."

"She picked up an enterprising snail that was crawling out of the open basket. She threw it back in and muttered, ‘God take power from the devil.’ I wondered if it was the same snail, crawling out, being thrown back in, and then crawling out again. Determined. I wanted to buy the whole basket and set that one snail free."

"We did not scale the rod because we ... could, we scaled it because we were terrified ... we couldnt."

"It was hard to turn my head, but I did it and looked away."

"Rain splashed across the floor of the veranda, even though the sun blazed and I had to narrow my eyes to look out the door of Aunty Ifeoma’s living room. Mama used to tell Jaja and me that God was undecided about what to send, rain or sun. We would sit in our rooms and look out at the raindrops glinting with sunlight, waiting for God to decide."

"The painting ... represented something lost, something I had never had, would never have."

"He was gracious, in the eager-to-please way that he always assumed with the ... white religious."

"Morality, as well as the sense of taste, is relative.’"