How we cite our quotes: The main text of the story is cited (Chapter.Paragraph). The date headers are not counted as paragraphs. The verses in the chapters with a single passage from the narrator's religious texts are cited (Chapter.Verse.Line#). In chapters with multiple passages, the verses are cited (Chapter.Verse#.Line#). The four section pages with the years and passages are cited (Year.Verse).
Quote #1
Crazy to live without a wall to protect you. Even in Robledo, most of the street poor—squatters, winos, junkies, homeless people in general—are dangerous. They're desperate or crazy or both. That's enough to make anyone dangerous. (2.20)
Sometimes, writers and pundits romanticize the street poor. The homeless, they might say, are mostly virtuous people who are suffering from a lack of charity or justice on the part of the rest of society. That's not what Lauren observes here. She sees that most—most, not all—of the street poor are a threat to her. They're dangerous because they're desperate and sometimes crazy. Lauren intends to survive and succeed, and that means she can't afford any illusions.
Quote #2
There's a big, early-season storm blowing itself out in the Gulf of Mexico. [...] There are over 700 known dead so far. [...] That's nature. Is it God? Most of the dead are the street poor who have nowhere to go and who don't hear the warnings until it's too late for their feet to take them to safety. Where's safety for them anyway? Is it a sin against God to be poor? We're almost poor ourselves. There are fewer and fewer jobs among us, more of us being born, more kids growing up with nothing to look forward to. One way or another, we'll all be poor some day. The adults say things will get better, but they never have. How will God—my father's God—behave toward us when we're poor? (2.45)
In this passage, Lauren considers the treatment of the poor. Not unlike the Katrina tragedy in real life, the poor in Lauren's near-future United States didn't hear warnings soon enough to escape a natural disaster. It all makes Lauren think that people view it as a sin to be poor (and in the United States, a lot of people do), and she also thinks that poverty is getting worse countrywide.
Later in the book, Lauren's solution is for people to turn to God, namely her God, change. That word is indeed very powerful as a motivator—just think of Barack Obama's successful 2008 presidential campaign, which in the face of an economic crash used the word change (along with hope) as a way to rally support.
Quote #3
I like Curtis Talcott a lot. Maybe I love him. Sometimes I think I do. He says he loves me. But if all I had to look forward to was marriage to him and babies and poverty that just keeps getting worse, I think I'd kill myself. (8.9)
Lauren's a clear-eyed person: instead of just romanticizing Curtis, she also thinks about his strategic value to her. She says he can offer her only babies and poverty, which will keep getting worse, so maybe it's no wonder that Lauren focuses on Earthseed instead as something to give herself a mission with.