It is a mother's duty to teach her daughters about the uses of blood, particularly a magical daughter.

The woman leant forward, her eyes flashing, a smile both triumphant and tender curving her mouth."You are *my* daughter," she said. "Can there be any doubt that you will be brilliant -- audacious -- and free?"The vision disappeared. She had been so vital, so overflowing with life and energy, that her going seemed to leave the room dark.

What are acquaintance for, if not to supply the pleasures of gossip?

... it is strange to know you would be cast off by the people who greet you so warmly, if they knew the whole truth about you.

Are you going? What shall you wear?""I shall go in what I am standing in," said Mak Genggang. "A witch is always appropriate whatever her attire.

Whether I'm a good wife doesn't have anything to do with what he was like.

Magic ran in the family. Even her mother's second cousin, who was adopted, did small spells on the side. She sold these from a stall in Kota Bharu. Her main wares were various types of fruit fried in batter, but if you bought five pisang or cempedak goreng, she threw in a jampi for free.

The aunts’ conception of the right to privacy went far enough to allow you to close the toilet door when you were peeing, but no further.

I might go anywhere and do any magic I pleased if I were Peter, not Prunella.

I can speak four dialects, but none of them is fairy language.

I thought: if I die, I hope I get reincarnated into a mosquito so I can bite that fucker kau-kau.

Other dragons are bastards. I moved out of my mother's cave after my mother tried to rip my guts out.Granted, I had tried to steal her Tiara of Clairvoyance.

The tabloids wanted to know whether the dragon was receiving benefits. The gossip magazines claimed to have found a woman who was bearing the dragon's baby. The fashion magazines did spreads on draconian style. This apparently consisted of gaunt models with sunken eyes, swathed in clouds of chiffon and arranged in awkwardly erotic positions on piles of gold coins.

I brought seaweed snacks from home,' chimed in another kid. "Seaweed got iron, right?"'I don't think the teachers meant that kind of iron,' said Hui Ann.

The first time she saw the boy across the classroom, Ah Lee knew she was in love because she tasted durian on her tongue.

But a woman should not marry where there is no respect. Respect is the most important thing.

He would gaze at her with intrigued longan seed eyes.

Love was like swallowing a cili padi whole.

How could you die and not be old enough to hear about premarital sex? How could you die and still not be allowed to fall in love or be honest? Surely not everything had to wait for university and a good job. Passion and truth had to trump even those things.