America is a teenage girl who lives in the province of Carolina in the country of Illéa. As the main protagonist in The Selection, America is a Five, which puts her in the bottom half of the Illéan castes. America’s family often struggles to get by, and they don’t always have enough money for food, but America is still “content to be a Five” (8). She values her personal relationships more than her own comfort or reputation, and America only cares about money when it comes to taking care of her loved ones. As a musician, America earns her living by performing at parties. She claims that she’s “been in the homes of enough Twos and Threes to be sure [she] never wanted to live among them, let alone be a One” (8), and although her mother urges her to find a husband from a higher caste, America cannot bring herself to care about social-climbing or castes.

When describing herself, America declares that she “[has] a bit of a temper,” and she “get[s] a lot of [her] stubbornness from [her mother]” (245). Unlike the other girls in the Selection, America doesn’t want to be there, and when she first arrives, she has no interest in securing the crown or winning Maxon’s approval.