One of Us Is Dead

Jenny’s salon, Glow, symbolizes Buckhead’s community of high-society women. The business is incredibly exclusive and expensive: “There’s a waiting list to even become a client here now, and I only accept twenty-five full-time clients. By full-time, I mean my clients agree to have a minimum of eight services a month” (14). Most of these women don’t work outside the home, which allows them to be “full-time” clients rather than professionals. They spend their time at Glow, whose limited capacity and high demand makes it an exclusive institution. Olivia explicitly applies this approach even to her social circle. Planning to exile Shannon from their group, she decides Crystal will join, reasoning, “There was power in numbers, so I couldn’t just kick people out without replacing them” (194).

The women treat Glow as the social heart of their community, and Olivia is equally determined to top its hierarchy. All of the members use the beauty salon as another kind of salon. They treat it as their “own living room, hosting book clubs, wine nights, hangouts for gossip, and committee meetings” (15). Only Olivia presumes to go further. She insists that she “made” Jenny by bringing her a wealthier clientele, and she tries to impose business decisions on her.