"Taking care a white babies, that's what I do, along with all the cooking and the cleaning."
Chap. 1, p. 1

"You'd never know it, living here, but Jackson, Mississippi be filled with two hundred thousand peoples."
Chap. 2, p. 12

"Tuck it in Minny. Tuck in whatever might fly out my mouth and tuck in my behind, too. Look like a maid that does what she's told."
Chap. 3, p. 40

"If chocolate was a sound it would've been Constantine's voice singing. If singing was a color, it would've been the color of that chocolate."
Chap. 5, p. 67

"I watch the television, riveted. Yet I am neither thrilled nor disappointed by the news that they might let a colored man into Ole Miss, just surprised."
Chap. 6, p. 83

"I guess I thought it would be like visiting Constantine, where friendly colored people waved and smiled, happy to see the little white girl whose daddy owned...