“I feel heat creeping up my neck and know my skin’s probably going red and splotchy. It does this whenever I’m embarrassed” (14).

“Here are my good traits: big green eyes, straight white teeth, high cheekbones, long legs. Here are my bad traits: a too long nose, skin that gets blotchy when I’m nervous, a flat butt” (17).

“She curls a fist around the necklace I always wear—a thin gold chain with a tiny bird charm hanging from it, a gift from my grandmother—and tugs gently” (83).

"And this time, when I imagine myself lying somewhere, I’m not sleeping. This time I imagine myself stretched out on a cold stone slab, skin as white as milk, lips blue, and hands folded across my chest like they’ve been placed there…” (116).

“Tara helps get me into my dress again, and after I slip on the fur shrug and the earrings and let my hair down—which is all wavy from being twisted in a half-knot all day—I turn to the mirror and my heart actually reindeer-prances in my chest. I look at least twenty-five. I look like somebody else…I remember the sick taste of disappointment every time my face reemerged, as plain as it ever was. But this time when I open my eyes…there I am: different and gorgeous and not myself” (238).

“I’m checking my makeup for the fiftieth time in the flip-down mirror. I put a final slick of lip gloss on and fish a gummy piece of mascara from the corner of my eyelashes…” (369).