55 pages • 1 hour read
Foxglove
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Character Analysis
Signa Farrow
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of gender discrimination, pregnancy termination, animal death, and sexual content.
Signa Farrow is the primary protagonist of the Belladonna series. Signa, a wealthy heiress, was orphaned as a baby when her parents were both poisoned at a ball they were hosting. After her parents died, Signa bounced between uncaring relatives who were only interested in the stipend that came with her guardianship, hoping she would take care of them once she accessed her inheritance when she turned 20. All of these relatives died early, leading community members to believe Signa is cursed or a witch. However, Signa finds a family in her distant cousins, the Hawthornes, once she moves to Thorn Grove, and feels even less lonely once she begins her relationship with Death.
Death has followed Signa throughout her childhood, leading her to hate it. Signa has had the power to see Death and the spirits of the dead since infancy, first encountering him at the party where her parents and all of the guests were poisoned. In Belladonna, Signa’s death powers expand as the novel progresses and she begins to recognize Death’s complexity and learns more about his world. She also learns about the balance between life and death as she makes choices to spare certain lives and take others. Ultimately, Signa gives into her powers, understanding that they are helpful and not only harmful. This coincides with her romantic relationship with Death, which demonstrates Signa’s evolving feelings toward death throughout the novel.
However, in Foxglove, Signa again doubts her powers, afraid that she is doing more harm than good with them. Though she does not regret deciding to kill her cousin Percy at the end of the previous novel, she does feel guilty for using her powers to end his life. When she discovers that she may have powers of creation in addition to those of destruction, she pursues them even when it may mean leaving Death. Despite her mixed feelings about her powers and her relationship with the supernatural, Signa’s main priority is always her family. Signa’s reward for protecting her family and putting herself last is her home at Foxglove Manor, where she feels more at peace than she ever has before, and her new, honest relationship with Blythe.
Blythe Hawthorne
Blythe Hawthorne has a minor role in Belladonna but is the secondary protagonist of Foxglove and plays a major part in the novel’s plot. She comes from an affluent and relatively loving family, but the lives of the Hawthornes took a turn for the worse a few months before the beginning of the series. While trying to poison his biological mother/governess, Blythe’s brother, Percy, killed Blythe’s mother. He was trying to poison Blythe when Signa interfered. For months, Blythe was an invalid, constantly on the brink of death, yet she defied the odds three times. By cheating Death and Fate in this way, Blythe gained the power to peek into the world of the supernatural, allowing her to see those with inhuman powers.
Blythe is characterized by her stubbornness, interest in the truth, and distaste for traditional social values. In Belladonna, Signa is shocked to learn that Blythe intends never to marry, which shows her great independence in a world where women have few choices for their futures. However, Blythe’s prolonged illness leads many people, including members of her family, to see her as weak and incapable. Blythe takes pleasure in proving them wrong, using her wits, talents, and fortitude to surprise various characters throughout the novel. She shows particular strength when she takes the lead in investigating Julius’s murder and the framing of her father when others will not help. Often putting herself in physically and socially compromising situations, Blythe shows that, like Signa, she is willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of her family. She makes the ultimate sacrifice at the end of the novel, when she agrees to bind herself to Fate so her cousin may be free and live with the man she loves, despite Blythe’s earlier declaration that she would never marry.
At the end of the novel, Death and Signa discover that Blythe is the reincarnation of Life. Blythe unintentionally uses Life’s throughout the novel, as when she resurrects a dead foal and brings Eliza back from the brink of death. The Epilogue reveals that Blythe retains some memories from her time as Life, though they are hazy and she does not understand them. The public announcement of her engagement to Prince Aris at the end of the novel sets up the plot of Wisteria, the next book in the Belladonna series.
Fate/Prince Aris
Fate is the human embodiment of the concept of fate and destiny. An unknown song guides Fate as he weaves symbolic tapestries representing humans’ fate. He uses threads to weave these tapestries and to control the humans around him, pausing and manipulating their lives at will. Fate believes he has total control over all humans because he lays out their destiny, but Blythe beats him at his own game, cheating him a four times by the novel’s close. For millennia, before they met Life, Fate and his brother, Death, were the only supernatural beings on Earth. Fate fell deeply in love with Life and married her, yet when Life knew it was her time to die, Fate forbade Death from taking her. After some time, Death could not let Life live any longer, and Fate not only had to grieve her death but his relationship with his brother.
For much of the novel, Fate believes that Life has reincarnated as Signa Farrow, whom Fate wants to steal from his brother. Pretending to be Prince Aris of Dryden, Fate infiltrates Signa’s community in an attempt to either woo her or force her hand in marriage. However, Signa and Blythe consistently outsmart him. Though Signa initially hates Fate, seeing him as the complete opposite of Death, she begins to see him as a sad and desperate man who would do anything to regain the love of his life.
Fate rarely lets others see this side of him, instead wearing a mask he uses used to draw others in and make them do his bidding. Similarly, his residence at Wisteria Gardens reflects Fate’s true emotional state but he can change it based on how he wants people to see it. Though the narrative initially suggests Fate is the villain of Foxglove, his character becomes more nuanced and sympathetic throughout the novel. However, his conviction that he is totally in control of human life does not wane throughout the novel, and when Blythe outwits him at the end of the novel, it leaves him enraged and saddened.
Death
Death is the embodiment of the concept of death and Signa’s romantic interest. The narrative describes him as shrouded in shadows. He can change his appearance and size at will, which he does to help souls transition to the afterlife. In Belladonna, Death recognized something special about Signa when she was an infant and prevented her from dying. Like Signa, Death often describes himself as lonely, only able to be around people for the final moments of their lives and unable to touch them without causing their death. Signa’s powers make her the one person Death can touch without killing. This leads Death to be selfish regarding Signa, and he protects her throughout her life by causing the deaths of her cruel and selfish guardians.
Grace humanizes the character of Death, giving him emotions and needs just like any other character. Though he abides by certain rules regarding his duties, he cares little for the frivolous rules of humans. Despite this, he is drawn toward Signa throughout her life. When Fate tries to claim Signa as his wife, Death promises to stay by her side as long as she will have him, even if it means resisting his brother. Death has always felt at odds with Fate, believing that Fate does not meddle enough in the affairs of humans to help them, as Death occasionally does. The rift between the brothers haunts Death, who feels guilty both for not keeping Life alive and for keeping her alive so long that her death caused the black plague, unnecessarily killing thousands.
Unlike Signa, Death is at peace with his powers and using them, though he feels sympathy for the humans he kills, especially when their deaths are unnecessary, as with the plague victims. At the end of the novel, Blythe’s outwitting of Fate allows Death and Signa to finally be together physically without the boundaries of their powers, and the two plan to make a home at Foxglove together.
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