How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Title.Paragraph)
Quote #4
I am gathering up my bowl and my bundle when the aging bird girl comes in. With her is another girl, a much younger girl. She is wearing a bright yellow dress and clutching a bundle of rough homespun clothes in her arms. (91.NewGirl.1)
Lakshmi is allowed out of her room because she has lost some of her value as a slave—she is no longer a virgin. And yet another girl is led in immediately. What can we infer about Mumtaz's business and each girl's journey to Happiness House?
Quote #5
The strangeness of walking—moving more than a few paces to the window and back—makes the journey of a dozen steps feel like a million. And the hallway, a stretch of bare floor and cracked walls, seems to me wonderful, new and foreign and vast, and strange. (92.WhatIsNormal.3)
Lakshmi was locked in the room for weeks as Mumtaz used her and broke her spirit. How does Lakshmi feel about the tiny bit of freedom she gets to move about the house now? How might this be a strategic choice on the part of Mumtaz?
Quote #6
That new girl, the one in your old room, she says.
Yesterday morning Mumtaz found her handing from the rafters. (95.EverythingINeedtoKnowNow.18)
Lakshmi chose not to commit suicide, but the new girl decides death is better than sexual slavery. Why didn't Lakshmi take this course of action, and why might a girl choose to end her life after arriving in Happiness House?