Surrounded by liquor, thinner, and pills, she was expected to live for a while and then die in the mud among the latrines on Soweto's Sector B. Out of all of them, Nombeko was the one to break loose. She left her shack for the first and last time.
-- Narrator (chapter 1)

Importance: This quote, said early in the story, sets up the breadth of her character. That she was born to poverty in a place where everybody was poor and parents had no control over their children's futures. That her mother poisoned her body and left her 12-year-old daughter alone and poor. Despite these disadvantages, this girl taught herself to speak and add, and found a way to learn to read, found a job, and earned money honestly. The writer is telling the reader that this girl will manage to rise above her circumstances and do something more; and that it started with...