… it was the law of summers among the rich that the season of leisure should flow like a large and charming river. The imperative was to have a good time and float along on the luminescent surface. You couldn’t back down or show weakness.”
-- Narration   (Part 1, Chapter Two )

Importance: This quote summarizes one of the essential qualities of their day-to-day experience as wealthy young people on Hydra that lead Naomi and Sam to the adrenaline-stimulating choices they make, with each other and eventually with Faoud: they are, on a fundamental level, bored with themselves and with their lives. Also, this quote offers an example of how the book develops its thematic interest in the power and influence of money - in this case, the power of too much money to make life easy and, again, boring.

… there was something in [Faoud's] unexpected confidence that struck her as being less innocent than Naomi wanted to...
-- Narration (Part 1, Chapter Seven)