Gilda often positions herself as a detached biologist observing human behavior. She expresses her detachment from herself and others through similes and metaphors that compare people and their attributes to animals. Gilda calls her heart a “bird on fire” that tries to escape her ribcage to communicate how her panic attacks feel (29). She observes nurses working in the hospital as if they are birds building nests or “deer in a meadow” (67). These similes and metaphors of animal-like behavior allow Gilda to distance herself from human activities. Simultaneously, her comparison of humans to other animals allows her to marvel at human behavior. She thinks the human abilities to tend to others in illness and attend concerts are staggering because other animals don’t do them.

Gilda indirectly reminds readers that we ourselves are animals. While this initially fuels her pessimism over the meaninglessness of life, the mere existence of animals ultimately allows her to find value in life. In the final scene of the novel, Gilda gushes to Eleanor about the wondrous qualities of dandelions, pigs, and apes. She believes if humans had found these forms of life on any other planet, they would think them “the most remarkable, precious aliens” (227).