Character Description

• Eric "Moby" Calhoune is the narrator and protagonist. He is a high school senior, whose obesity made him a social outcast (and earned him the loving marine nickname "Moby"). Now a member of the swim team, he has slimmed considerably but pledges to stay fat for Sarah Byrnes in order to maintain their friendship. Living with his single mother, Eric is portrayed early on as a coward and not very intelligent but progresses as the story moves on.

• Ms. Lemry is a supportive, caring teacher at the high school. She is also the coach of Eric's swim team. Lemry offers a class for seniors to discuss deep contemporary issues and thoughts. She is also married, but has no children. Ms. Lemry is seen as one of Eric's closest adult confidants and develops a very close relationship with Sarah Byrnes later in the novel.

• Sarah Byrnes was badly burned on her face and hands by what she describes as a childhood accident. Abandoned by her mother, she is left to live with her father who refuses to allow reconstructive surgery. Her scars become a shield to hide her true feelings. As a younger student, Sarah Byrnes is portrayed as a spunky, tenacious, get-in-your-face kind of girl, but her true sensitive side begins to show as the book progresses.

• Dale Thornton is a stereotypical bully who lives in the "bad" part of town and was repeatedly held back in junior high, eventually dropping out. Once an enemy of Eric and Sarah, he becomes their ally in the end of the novel.

• Mark Brittain is a devout Christian who isnt afraid to shove his beliefs "down the throats" of others. He is a very sensitive person without a sense of humor, which makes public humiliation, or what he calls "religious persecution", very difficult for him to take.

• Steve Ellerby is one of Eric's closest friends who describes himself as "a controversial Episcopalian preacher's kid." (292) A member of the swim team, Steve and Eric often team up in the pool and take advantage of Mark Brittain. Ellerby is an easy going, loose humored student with whom many question the validity of his religious beliefs.

• Mr. Mautz is the short-tempered vice principal whom Eric believes to have a vendetta toward him, Sarah Byrnes, and Dale Thornton. Mautz is very short-sighted and black-and-white in his views that allow little or no room for compromise.

• Virgil Byrnes is Sarah's manipulative and abusive father.