Sparse Yet Dramatic
Nikki, our narrator, feeds us information in a simple, pretty unadorned style. She's not given to wildly descriptive flights of fancy. For example, when the Feed is over, Nikki is "struck by how attractive" (P.35) Cole still is—but the only visual we get is how "His blond hair framed his dark eyes" (P.35). Um, hello, there's a lot more to a person's appearance than eye and hair color; blonde hair and dark eyes do not automatically equal handsome. But Nikki keeps it simple, so we're just going to have to take her word for it.
However, Nikki's also prone to making dramatic statements. Take, for instance, her description of the Feed: "Cole bought himself another hundred years of life by draining me, and in the abyss left over there was no peace. Only an emptiness that made me ache as if my insides had been scraped out" (2.6). We don't think Nikki really has an abyss inside her—she's just busting out the theatrics to dig into the scope of her pain to make sure we know how freaking massive it is. This is in stark contrast to her super simple description of Cole earlier.
Nikki's all about enhancing the emotional and dramatic impact of whatever it is she's feeling. So when she first starts talking to Jack again after her Return, she says: "My heart felt like it would burst through my chest into a million little pieces, and I could see this wasn't going to work" (5.33). Yep. Again we see Nikki bringing the drama.
And here's the thing: Overall, the storytelling style has us focusing less on appearances and more on emotions. Nikki keeps things sparse when describing how people look, but really lays the description on thick when it's time to describe feelings. This is totally fitting since the story's about stealing emotions, not stealing faces.