"If I'm the one who came from a backward world, why am I the one held responsible" (p. 74).

"When people go where they don't belong, they only make problems for themselves" (p. 170).

"Whatever doesn't destroy you, makes you stronger. Hardships have a way of toughening us, if they don't kill us" (p. 183).

"Except I know that many of the things you all think are so important, things like family lineage and great wealth, don't guarantee happiness...Liking yourself...for who you really are and not what others want you to be [does]" (p. 185).

"Would I have turned out this way had I been the first baby born and the one given to the Dumas family? Did the evil of that act settle in her tiny heart like a lump of coal and infect her every thought and feeling? Would that have happened to me" (p. 192).

"It's all right...