I really liked this book. It’s beautifully written, very reflective and emotional. Even though I didn’t like the main character in some ways, I still found her relatable. It’s very open and honest and sometimes hard to read because of how desperately the main character looks for validation through other people... 

“It was my feeling that there were lucky people and unlucky people, and I was a lucky person. Even in my worst depressions, I had always known this. My misery seem to come from knowing how I was not good enough to warrant the objectively lucky life I’ve been given."

"So what would you choose? Either you can be famous for being a shrill prop and a great man’s work, a victim, sacrifice to the gods of art, or you cannot along and applied. You can have a seat at the big boys table for being such a good sport. So, go ahead: ha ha ha."

"This is part of the horror and being hurt generically. Your experiences are so common that they become impossible to speak about an interesting way."

"I knew it was childish, behaving this way, but it was painful to be reminded so casually that everything I cared about, was subject to the whims of others."

"I craved with visceral, addict thirst the experience of buying a frozen pizza and a bottle of wine and not thinking remotely of anyone else."

"I made mistakes like that all the time, seeking affirmation from the very worst people, so that what I must have been after deep down was a confirmation of the fears instead of their dismissals."

"How lucky I have been that so much of my pain is from fearing the loss of what I already have, instead of suffering the absence entirely, like Ciaran did."

"I found this outrageous. I was shocked that he was not impressed and cowed by my delicacy, as other boys had been. Why did he not find my frail, picturesque sadness alluring? You always think your pain is the most painful. You always think it’s uniquely awful.”

“It was already so near impossible to say no to a man, so difficult to accept the possibility of being g hurt or disliked or shouted at. It takes so much out of you to say he’s, to be accommodating, to make men happy."

“I always thought that a man’s love would make me so full up I’d never need to drink or eat or cut or do anything at all to my body again. I thought they’d take it over for me. But now here I was, right inside it with nobody to say what happened next. What would I think about, now I wasn’t thinking about love or sex? That would be the next thing, trying to figure out what to fill up all that space with. But that was all right. That would follow.”