“And as the recession continues and our prospects look bleaker and bleaker, I’m excited. I look to the past to see what our future will be like. And in times of economic hardship and harsh governments, of pointless wars and mass unemployment, there was pop art and there was punk, there was hip hop and grafitti, there was acid house and riot grrrl. There was art and music and books that could bring you to your knees with their utter perfection. Because, when everything else is gone, all we’re left with is our imaginations.”

“Adorkable is a freeform, loose-knit, organic network of like-minded souls who might get pushed to the ground for the way we think and the way we look and because we’re not afraid of who we are, but my God we’re looking up at the stars.”

“What you look like is just one part of who you are - but it's not all you are.”

“We're broken. It's like we have all these jagged edges that scare other people off, but when we're with each other, our jagged edges fit together and we're almost whole.”

“The Ad♥rkable Manifesto 1. We have nothing to declare but our dorkiness.2. Jumble sales are our shopping malls.3. Better to make cookies than be a cookie-cutter.4. Suffering doesn’t necessarily improve you but it does give you something to blog about.5. Experiment with Photoshop, hair dye, nail polish and cupcake flavours but never drugs.6. Don’t follow leaders, be one.7. Necessity is the mother of customisation.8. Puppies make everything better.9. Quiet girls rarely make history.10. Never shield your oddness, but wear your oddness like a shield.”

“I sat there listening to him talk and talk and I realised something really important.I thought I was in love with him for all those years but it turned out I was in love with the idea of William. The actual reality was a bit of an anti-climax.I thought, well, William would never shove the word WAG into pop songs to make me laugh and he wouldn’t bite the chocolate off chocolate-covered strawberries for me and he’d never, ever watch a film with Sandra Bullock in it, unless it was a Shakespeare adaptation and then he’d spend the entire film listing all the historical inaccuracies and he’d never go down on me for half an hour because he’d lost a game of Scrabble. Point of fact, I can’t imagine William doing anything that would mess up his hair, and he’s started popping the collars of his shirts and have I mentioned that he’s not you? He’s not you, Max, and that’s why I’m actually really pleased that he’s engaged and he’s moving to Warwickshire so I don’t have a constant reminder of what an idiot I’ve been.”

“And suddenly I got what the big deal was about kissing. How someone could suck on your bottom lip and make you come completely undone. That someone stroking the hair back from your face could make you swoon and someone sliding his hands underneath your top could make you feel wanted for the first time in your life.”