Autobiography of a Face  Autobiography of a Face is a memoir by Lucy Grealy in which she narrates her life before and after being diagnosed with Ewing's sarcoma. The memoir describes her life from the age of nine to adulthood. In this memoir, she narrates the consequences of the disease in her emotional life as well as the physical implications that it had on her face, which resulted in a lifetime of self-consciousness. When interviewed about the novel in 1994 by Charley Rose, the author explained that the books principal theme was identity. The novel was first published in 1994, and a renamed British edition was released in 1995 under the name "In the Minds Eyes." The prologue introduces the reader to Lucy's struggle with self-image. She describes her work at the stable Diamond D, which was her first job after finishing chemotherapy. Through this first narration, Lucy introduces her family's situation both emotionally and financially. Moreover, she begins talking about the stares that she received from children which she did not know if they were better than the hidden looks from adults. Lucy brings the reader back with flashbacks of fourth grade. Being a tomboyish girl, she would play with boys and participate in dares. However, one day during physical education she bumps into Joni Friedman's head. Later at night, while doing her homework she feels a toothache and thinks that this would be her way to get out of going to school the next day. While her mother worries, her father tells her that it's just a toothache. However, the next day when she visits the dentist, she receives her first diagnosed as having fractured her jaw. Nevertheless, after performing an X-ray, she is told that she had a dental cyst and that she needed emergency surgery. She thoroughly describes her operation and her experience with anesthesia and says that back to school she felt like a warrior for experiencing something the other kids hadn't. Six months after her operation, “a bony knob” had appeared at the tip of her jaw. Her mother asked the doctor repeatedly about it, but he dismissed her by saying that it was just a "bony growth". Yet as the situation worsened, she is back at the hospital and undergoes multiple tests, including a bone marrow examination. She is diagnosed with Ewing's sarcoma, however, no one describes it to her as cancer until further in the disease which makes her not assimilate the diagnosis as she should. She meets Derek at the hospital and he becomes his partner in mischievous adventures around the hospital.