The novel opens as Sophie Amundsen is heading home from school with her friend, Joanna. Joanna compares the human brain to a computer, but Sophie disagrees— “surely a person was more than a piece of hardware?” (3). They part ways as they continue heading home and Sophie marvels at the natural beauty around her, wondering what makes it so. Her house is on the edge of town and has a large garden in its yard. She lives with her mother and father and a menagerie of pets, though her father is away for most of the year working as an oil tanker captain, and her mother often works late hours. Her favourite pet is her cat, Sherekan.

Sophie opens her mailbox and finds a letter addressed to her with no sender or stamp. The piece of paper inside simply reads “Who are you?” (4). She takes the letter inside and ponders this thought while looking at herself in a mirror; she resents her unconventional looks and realizes she does not know the answer to this question, nor did she choose to be who she is. The next day, she goes out into the garden and ponders the sheer marvel of being alive, thinking of her Granny who recently passed before it occurs to her to check the mailbox again.