When I finally have a boyfriend, little else will matter.
-- Narrator (Everything I Knew About Love as a Teenager)

Importance: In the first chapter of Everything I Know About Love, the author is a teenager who believes that romantic love supersedes all other connections. As an adolescent, Alderton considers romantic relationships to be an indicator of self-worth and achievement. She chooses to open her memoir, with this assertion in order to establish the ethos that guides her early romantic pursuits and interactions with her friends.

I scan the room for boys with working limbs and a detectable pulse.
-- Narrator (The Bar Party Chronicles; UCL Halls, New Year's Eve 2006)

Importance: At a New Year’s Eve party, the author enters the USL residence halls in pursuit of a romantic interest. She finds confidence in male attention and needs the validation of sexual intrigue to feel visible. Her base line standards for a sexual partner, working limbs and a detectable pulse, serve to highlight her desperation for masculine attention. She cannot enjoy the...