“To Cecily, it had felt like a dawn of a new age. But her hope for a better colonizer was short-lived.”

This passage foreshadows Cecily’s character arc in the novel. She begins her narrative as a hopeful believer in the cause of Asia for Asians. Once the true nature of the Japanese occupation becomes clear, however, she quickly realizes The Illusion of the Benevolent Colonizer.

“The brief joy of revolt died down, and the neighbors remembered once again that during a war, the only priority was one’s own family. They could not waste their time on the missing children of others.”

Following the disappearance of Abel, the neighborhood of Bintang comes together to search for the missing boy, defying the whims of the Kenpeitai. In this passage, however, their solidarity is short-lived, abandoning their willingness to resist the Japanese occupation in favor of self-preservation.

“They lived in a small house with an orange roof, not at all beautiful but very functional. And yet she was unbearably discontent. Every morning she would stand in the hot kitchen making half-boiled eggs for her husband and children. She would pour black coffee into little tin mugs, a smile on her face, sometimes a song on her lips. But while cooking, singing, and doing all the chores that simulated a quiet, small world of domestic bliss, she would fantasize about cracking the boiling eggs on her husband’s head and throwing hot coffee in the children’s faces. It made her sick with shame.”

Cecily is characterized by her dissatisfaction with British domestic life. This passage summarizes this character trait by explaining her desire to violently upend the peace of her home. Her desire to break from the habits of domesticity does not necessarily mean she wants to commit violence against her family, however, which is why her fantasies fill her with shame.