Twenty good friends cannot live together in twenty good years”. We were more than twenty who left the school and the simple statement was beginning to echo hard in my ear, as if grandma actually had that particular day in mind. Pg.100

The feast was seen everywhere and in everything. Some women in semi-dresses were busy doing many things at once. Domestic animals were crying their last, with knives on their throats. They too were celebrating the feast in their own ways.Pg.93

Kukurukuuu,’ our big rooster crowed as usual and it nearly put me off my sleep. My eyes were neither open nor close. In trying to go back to sleep I rolled to both sides on my small wooden bed, covered with a mat. The room was partially dark and warm, sleepless rats busy under my bed in search of food.

Dry your tears, woman, the boy will be found. Nobody can do him anything…” Gradually, the tears began to dry from Etusi’s eyes, thanks to Okokpujie’s words, a mighty force that swung the entire village to action. Pg.38

Tell me my little children, what crime has this lizard committed that it must die this evening?” There was silence. In raising my head like a joke, I tried to laugh. That was the same time I realized that grandma was dead serious with us.Pg.26

It is you who need to go, Amende. Go home; your friends are waiting for you. Pg.63

I wish I were like you pa. I wish I had not been afraid, all my life! Pg.55

Grandma; it was to grandma I truly wanted to have returned, but she was no more. I could only remember the day she died. The tears mother shed on me, as if I was going to face a more difficult world than any other member of our family. Pg.100

This land has brought forth numerous children, favouring both the bad and the good ones. It is not the land that is responsible for the people’s hardships, it is the people themselves. Pg.8