How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Once he and Roy had watched a man and woman in the basement of a condemned house. They did it standing up. The woman had wanted fifty cents, and the man had flashed a razor. (1.1.4)
John and his brother see a couple having sex near their home, and they get an early lesson in sex's unfortunate (and grody) relationship to commerce and violence. In their society, sex is often related to the exchange of money, and it is also dangerous and can have potentially deadly consequences.
Quote #2
And his mother and father, who went to church on Sundays, they did it too, and sometimes John heard them in the bedroom behind him, over the sound of rats' feet, and rat screams, and the music and cursing from the harlot's house downstairs. (1.1.6)
John's parents are married, so it shouldn't be so bad for them to have sex together. But look at the sound images that are stacked up next to it: "rats' feet" (eew), "rat screams (double eew), "music" (mood music is cool), and "cursing from the harlot's house downstairs" (um, that doesn't sound good). The poverty, filth, and violence that these sounds convey gives us a clue as to how John considers his parents' bedroom activities.
Quote #3
And as Father James spoke of the sin that he knew they had not committed yet, of the unripe fig plucked too early from the tree—to set the children's teeth on edge—John found himself grow dizzy in his seat and could not look at Elisha where he stood, beside Ella Mae, before the altar. (1.1.19)
Father James calls Elisha and Ella Mae's sin (which is just a potential sin, by the way; this is a preemptive strike against sexual sin) an unripe fig; the image is of a fruit that isn't ready to be picked, which is the teenagers' sexuality. If they pick it too early (go to bed before they're married) it won't be good to eat (uhhh… we'll let you fill in that part of the metaphor).