“The first thing Connor said when I saw him after he'd been at the outpost for a few months was, 'I see you got breasts, congratulations. I hope you know how to use them.”

“I didn’t tell him that the diagnosis camethree months after I got my first period. Like: Congratulations! You’re a woman. Now die”

“I didn't tell him that the diagnosis came three months after I got my first period. Like: Congratulations! You're a woman. Now die.”

“When he'd been small, people had said things like, "And what do you want to be, little man?" and he'd said, "I don’t know. What have you got?”

“The first week of school they spotted him using a tortoise-shell cigarette holder. When he'd overheard some of the boys whispering that he looked like a queer he'd gazed down his long nose at them and said he regarded that as a compliment since so many of the world's great men had been homosexual. Alas I've been sentenced to a life of mundane heterosexuality. I can only hope a few of you will be more fortunate.”

“I told Augustus the broad outline of my miracle: diagnosed with Stage IV thyroid cancer when I was thirteen. (I didn’t tell him that the diagnosis came three months after I got my first period. Like: Congratulations! You’re a woman. Now die.)”