You'll Be the Death of Me

Throughout You’ll Be the Death of Me, McManus uses descriptions of hairstyles to reveal aspects of her characters’ personalities. Ivy’s mother, Samantha Sterling-Shepard, wears her hair in a French twist, a hairstyle in which twisted hair is secured to the head with pins or combs. Ivy describes how her mother’s “blond hair is pulled back in her signature French twist […] even though it’s barely five a.m. in San Francisco” (1). Ivy explicitly identifies her mother’s signature hairstyle as a symbol of the “thoroughness and military precision she brings to everything” (1). Samantha’s hair reflects Ivy’s view of her mother: Samantha’s capacity to achieve control of all aspects of her life eludes Ivy. Even while nodding vigorously, Ivy’s mother’s hair remains perfect: “a strand of hair nearly escapes her French twist. But not quite. It wouldn’t dare” (1). Samantha’s French twist is a symbol of her precision and control, qualities her daughter Ivy desperately wants.

At the beginning of the novel, Ivy’s hair is styled in her “ever-present ponytail” (25)—a symbol of her anxious nature emphasized by the fact that she repeatedly plays with it while nervous. When she first sees Mateo, she begins “twisting the end of her ponytail around one finger” (29), providing a visual cue of internal emotion.