I liked the premise of historical fiction based on a real-life artist's family, but I really did not enjoy the depiction's of the younger daughter's mental illness and the older daughter's stressful predicament of hiding it from their cold, appearance-obsessed mother. With all of the horrors in the world right now, I just had a hard time reading about the physical and emotional suffering of children.

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for the opportunity to review a temporary digital ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.

This review is for a pre-release copy of The Painter's Daughters, that I was given via NetGalley. It is due for publication February 27th, 2024, and is 320-pages long in the kindle edition.

This is a historical fiction novel based on real-life English painter Thomas Gainsborough, who was married and had two daughters in 1700's England. The story is basically about Thomas's wife moving them into the city of Bath to introduce the girls to society, but the younger daughter has mental health issues that the older daughter Peggy tries to hide from others. Eventually Peggy falls in love and wants to move on with her life, but what will happen to Molly?

Fans of historical fiction will enjoy this novel with its period details and character studies. 4-stars.

"The Painter's Daughter" by Emily Howes is a poignant exploration of love, madness, and sisterly devotion set against the backdrop of 1700s England. With a compelling narrative centered around Peggy and Molly Gainsborough, daughters of the renowned painter Thomas Gainsborough, the novel skillfully delves into the complexities of family dynamics and societal expectations.

The strength of the book lies in its well-crafted characters, particularly Peggy. The portrayal of sisterly bonds and the challenges of dealing with Molly's mental struggles are portrayed very well and add emotional richness to the story. I did feel like the novel loses a bit of steam towards the end; I was eager for answer! But, despite this, the resolution provides a satisfying conclusion to the story, tying up the loose threads in a meaningful way.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thomas Gainsborough is a man who loves his craft, though he would prefer landscape painting to painting portraits for money, a gambler, a philanderer, who relies on his wife for money, and a father who sees his daughters as children to pet and paint but would rather be anywhere else when there is a problem. Both his daughters, Molly, a year older, and Peggy, who he calls Captain, would do anything to gain his affection, attention or approval.

The story is told by Molly and Peggy. All of the sudden a new character Meg makes an appearance. Her chapters seemed to be put in at odd times and interrupted the flow.

Molly and Peggy are inseparable and Peggy takes on the role of older sister always protecting Molly. Molly has instances where she seems to be in a fugue state never remembering what happened. She also was prone to sleepwalking. Peggy did whatever was necessary to hide her sister’s proclivities from anyone who could potentially remove Molly from her. Their mother determined that for financial reasons the family needed to move to a more urban area where her husband could generate more income. The girls were required to become part of society but Molly’s unstable behavior became a problem.

Peggy believes she will have to protect Molly forever as she cannot fathom Molly living on her own or with a husband and any man she would marry would have to accept Molly in the package. Eventually they both meet a musician friend of their father’s and both fell in love. How far will sister devotion go? Why is Meg important? It is an interesting twist that will keep you engaged.

Thank you Simon &Schuster and NetGalley for this ARC. All opinions are my own.

What a beautiful story. I had no real familiarity with Thomas Gainsborough or his life before reading this book, aside from being familiar with his paintings. However, this book was so interesting and enlightening I began reading about him after finishing it. The story follows the main character Peggy, Gainsborough's daughter, and another character named Meg, who is a barmaid. The storylines intertwine in the most interesting way, and I will not divulge further, but I was so happy and thought the story so touching. The insight, and setting for much of the story was so well researched and transporting that I was sad when it ended. However, the book was so beautiful I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for something truly well done. Highly recommend.

This ebook was provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is a fictional story about Peggy and Molly Gainsborough, the two daughters of a real English portrait painter Thomas Gainsborough. The story is about family life, mental illness, and what society expects of both women and men in the time period.

Peggy and Molly are close sisters and each other’s only companions growing up. They basically raise themselves given their father is focused on his art and their mother is consumed by making ends meet and being accepted into society along with her daughters. Molly experiences mental illness and Peggy starting as a child covers for her sister to provide protection from the stigma and usual practice of putting someone in an asylum.

A parallel story about Meg, a pregnant unmarried young woman, merges with the Gainsborough family backstory.

This is a heartbreaking story about what we do and give up for those we love and try to protect. I received this book from NetGalley for this review.

I have never heard of the 19th century painter but apparently he was famous throughout England and many of his paintings were of his two daughters. This story is an historical fiction of their lives. They start off in the countryside but the mother wants to move to the city to introduce her daughters to high society. The only problem is one of the daughters has a secret; she’s going mad and the sister has to protect her from anyone knowing or the mad sister will be sent to an asylum. As they get older and the episodes are happening more and more their lives are changing and not for the better.

Peggy and Molly Gainsborough are the daughters of a famous painter and are often the objects of his paintings. They are often called to be in society, and Molly has a mental condition that would make her vulnerable to being in an asylum. Peggy tries to shield Molly until she falls in love with a friend of her father's.

This was a beautiful story of sisters, family, and how far we can go to change another person's issues. It was beautifully written.

Based on the renowned artist Thomas Gainsborough’s paintings of his daughters, Emily Howes researches little known information and pieces together an intricate story of the family’s life. Molly and Peg are inseparable as children and Peg recognizes early on that Molly has mental health issues and struggles to help her. As Gainsborough seeks recognition of his work and Molly’s health issues tear at all of them we see that these were the times when asylum was the only answer. The strength portrayed by Peg as a loving caring sister and her understanding of how it affects both of their lives is very moving. Howes also adds Molly’s mother’s own story of illegitimacy as the child of the Duke of Beaufort which was fascinating. An absorbing detailed read. Thank you #NetGalley for the advance copy of #ThePaintersDaughters.

I wish that I could say I loved this book. I tried. I really did. But the jumping from what seemed to be modern thinking to what seemed to be appropriate thinking of the time was jolting. I could not stay present in the book. Ultimately, I would not be able to recommend this. And it's a shame because it really had all the earmarks of a book that would appeal to me.

Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of The Painter’s Daughters on exchange for my review.

The Painter’s Daughters weaves together two strands, one following sisters Molly and Peg through their childhood into adulthood, and the other following Meg at a major turning point in her life.

Questions about love and loyalty, and the lengths people will go to to ensure the wellbeing of their children and loved ones are key to this story. None of the characters live a life free from difficulties, though they all find pockets of pleasure and hope as well.

The story is engaging and readable. For those who enjoy family sagas, this would be a good read.

This review was made possible via an ARC through NetGalley

The Painter’s Daughters by Emily Howes is an exploration of the daughters of Thomas Gainsborough, the subjects of six of his paintings. The novel’s prose centers on colors, paints, and excess further highlighting that the daughters are raised by an artist in an artist house and their mother needs to help their father sell the paintings as well as the world of nobility their mother is trying to enter them into.

As children, Peggy realizes that her sister, Molly, is having trouble with her emotions, will walk around in the middle of the night with a blank stare, and will stop being present. Their father is aware of Molly’s mental health but puts pressure on Peggy to watch after her sister while the mother wants to ignore it.

Peggy catches her father having an affair, furthering creating tears in their relationship that started when they moved from Ipswich to London to give both of the girls better chances to become refined ladies and make connections for their future as well as to change Molly’s environment in the vain hopes that it would change her behavior. Peggy expresses a desire to paint in an effort to get her father’s attention again.

The novel deals most with the theme of parentified children and codependency, as Peggy is not only a parentified child, but is expected to care for her older sister–keeping Molly in line is the only thing Peggy can do to keep the two of them together and to keep everyone happy, but it comes at the cost of Peggy’s innocence and parts of her childhood. Children grow up and learn the worst parts of the world as they get older, but to be asked to be your older sibling’s caretaker is a very different thing when you’re still young and you are being asked to be constantly vigilant regarding said sibling’s mental health. Never fully having the chance to live for yourself is a heavy burden to bear and the author handles it sensitively and through the viewpoint of a child who doesn’t know what else to do.

Pregnancy, miscarriage, and sexual assault are all depicted in the book, so I suggest those triggered by this content proceed with caution.

I would recommend this to readers looking for historical women’s fiction dealing with parentified children or are interested in stories from the POV of the children of an artist. I would not recommend this to readers looking for a cozy read.

The Painter’s Daughters brings the story behind so many paintings of Thomas Gainsborough, renowned 18th century English painter.

The story explores the close bond between two sisters, Peggy and Molly Gainsborough. Molly is older, but Peggy knows she needs to protect her sister, who occasionally experiences mental confusion. They both enjoy roaming barefoot through the fields surrounding their home in Ipswich, but the mother stops it. She feels that the daughters need to be raised as proper ladies. Thus, the family moves to Bath, where Molly’s bouts progress and Peggy continues to cover it up as much as she can. When a man by the name Johann Fischer enters the scene, the sisters’ bond gets under fractured.

This story has a feel of a build up until the end, and the mystery aspect continues to linger to the very last pages. The story is told through the eyes of sisters and a young woman named Meg Grey. It is not clear what the connection is to the family, but Peggy questions the mystery behind her mother’s family. Those who are into mystery may have stronger connection to this lingering aspect.

The threads of the story are loose to the very end. I wished they were tied up much earlier. I’m more into straightforward storytelling rather than lingering mystery. That lingering aspect made me disengage with the story half-way through. For me tying the ends much earlier would make the read much more engaging, and understanding earlier on the direction of the story as half-way through I questioned the point of telling this story. I had to reread the synopsis to understand it.

Nevertheless, it is still a fascinating story of two sisters who are subject of their father’s many paintings. It always makes the experience much richer to be able to look at a painting and know a story behind it.

I enjoyed Peggy’s sharp tongue and honest observations without holding anything back. The sisters’ voices at the beginning of the story are very distinct, but as the story progresses I wished for more of character-development to make them distinct individuals with their traits besides devotion and protection.

This richly imagined story is written with outstanding prose which is the strong part of this story.

This is the story of two sisters and of how mental illness can affect their familial bond as they grow up. "The Painter's Daughters", takes place in 18th century England, a time when someone with mental disorders was locked away in a madhouse. The strange thing was that some of what the mentally ill sister would scream was true and not at all the ravings of a lunatic. This is also the story of a family; that of the British painter Thomas Gainsborough and the world that he and his family inhabited.

I did like this book very much and found it quite moving. The twist at the end made it all the more compelling and I do recommend this historically accurate novel.

This book is dark and grim. Nothing good happens in it. Not one thing and that brought me down. Then to make matters even more contentious, I didn't know the story wasn't fiction or that the characters weren't fictitious until I got to the end and read the author's notes. I went back and read the blurb again and it's under the category of historical fiction, so now I'm really confused.

I did some research on a few of the characters and they did exist. Thomas Gainsborough was a famous artist. He had two daughters. It may have helped to be able to read and understand the letter to the readers at the beginning of the book, but there were so many missing words and sentences that I couldn't make sense of it. I was hoping that wasn't going to be the case for the entire book. Fortunately, the story itself is readable and easily understood.

The story itself follows Molly, Peggy, their mother Margaret, and their father Thomas Gainsborough. It starts in Ipswich when the girls are young, frivolous, wild, and just doing kid things. It makes their mother crazy and all she does is rant and rave about how terrible they are and that she's going to end up in Bedlam because they won't behave. She didn't have a positive word for either of those girls at any time in the book. They were always doing something they shouldn't, not acting like ladies...she was like a siren that's stuck. Whir whir whir-SHUT UP already! She was never happy about anything. She was a miserable excuse for a mother and that left her children mired in guilt and self-doubt.

Her solution to it was to move to Bath and get them some culture. Thomas wanted to stay in Ipswich, but he made the move probably just to shut her up. I didn't appreciate that they abandoned their cat on the side of the road when they left. Just something else that added to the desolation of this story.

Thomas set up shop and was doing well for himself with the help of some friends. But while he's working and playing, he's losing touch with his daughters. Their mother was never in touch with them, unless it was to harp on them or tell them they had royal blood in them and let them hold a mysterious gold box with the letter F on it. I have to admit that the box intrigued me, too.

What these self-centered parents aren't seeing is that Molly is quite ill. She's having mental episodes where she doesn't know where she is, who she is, what she's doing, sleepwalking, then having no memory of it. Peggy covers for her like nothing else. She takes care of Molly and keeps her condition a secret from their parents until she can't anymore.

Meanwhile, there's another story going on about a girl named Meg. I wasn't sure how she was going to come out with her situation or how it related to Molly and Peggy, but the author did a great job of making the story come full circle.

As I said, there isn't even one happy moment in this book. The ending was particularly tragic. I was hoping for something much lighter than this, but it is a good story about sisterly devotion..

*I received a complimentary copy of this book from NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This is a moving and poignant story , which explores love, between sisters, mental illness, societal stigma and expected behaviors. I found it fascinating and couldn't put it down. Highly recommended.

A beautifully written tale about the 2 young daughters of renowned painter Thomas Gainsborough whose fierce love for each other is tested by mental illness, betrayal and loyalty.
Molly and Peg are young and precocious little girls growing up in the shadows of their father's work as he paints portraits of the gentry in 1759 Ipswich. They though they fiercely love their papa he is emotionally distant and their mother is more concerned with the girl's impending entry into society to pay them much attention as Molly begins to exhibit odd behaviors that the younger Peg begins to notice. As these odd behaviors begin to increase and are perceived as troublesome to their parents Peg often shoulders the blame in order to protect fragile Molly from herself because she knows that something is terribly wrong with her sister and is determined to keep her from harm's way even if she suffers for it. After the family moves to Bath, Peg is desperately trying to keep Molly from ending up in the asylum as her mental illness is manifesting itself more frequently with outbursts and mad declarations a fact that her parents are willing to accept as blatant as it is. When their mother can no longer cope with the girls' behavior the two sisters are sent away to school in hopes they will finally learn discipline and for a time Molly's mental illness is controlled while the girls are away at under Peg's watchful protection but as they grow up into refined young women Peg has dreams and hopes of her own and no longer wants to be Molly's constant protector a fact that is put to the test when she falls in love for the first time.
This was beautifully written and eloquent in its form, as well as moving and a bit sad, this was well worth the time I spent reading this, I couldn't put it down. Maybe this is so touching for me because I lost my sister a few months ago and this speaks volumes of the love sisters can have for one another. Recommended.

Thank you to author Emily Howes and NetGalley for granting me access to this lovely read.

This is a fictional story about Peggy and Molly Gainsborough, daughters of English portrait painter Thomas Gainsborough. Drawing both from history and weaving in a fictional story line Emily Howes paints a story about sisterhood, family life, mental illness, protection, obsession, and what society expects of both women and men in the 1700s.

This is a heartbreaking look into mental illness and the stigma it often brings. What people are willing to see regardless of the truth. Caregiver strain. What we are willing to do for those we love. Excuses we make for the ones we love. Excuses we make for ourselves in our care for those we love. Haunting beautiful Howes tells a tale that is gripping.


Description
Peggy and Molly Gainsborough—the daughters of one of England’s most famous portrait artists of the 1700s and the frequent subject of his work—are best friends. They spy on their father as he paints, rankle their mother as she manages the household, and run barefoot through the muddy fields that surround their home. But there is another reason they are inseparable: from a young age, Molly periodically experiences bouts of mental confusion, even forgetting who she is, and Peggy instinctively knows she must help cover up her sister’s condition.

When the family moves to Bath, it’s not so easy to hide Molly’s slip-ups. There, the sisters are thrown into the whirlwind of polite society, where the codes of behavior are crystal clear. Molly dreams of a normal life but slides deeper and more publicly into her delusions. By now, Peggy knows the shadow of an asylum looms for women like Molly, and she goes to greater lengths to protect her sister’s secret.

But when Peggy unexpectedly falls in love with her father’s friend, the charming composer Johann Fischer, the sisters’ precarious situation is thrown catastrophically off course. Her burgeoning love for Johann sparks the bitterest of betrayals, forcing Peggy to question all she has done for Molly, and whether any one person can truly change the fate of another.

A tense and tender examination of the blurred lines between protection and control, The Painter’s Daughters is a searing portrait of the real girls behind the canvas. Emily Howes’s debut is a stunning exploration of devotion, control, and individuality; it is a love song to sisterhood, to the many hues of life, and to being looked at but never really seen.


I received this book from NetGalley for this review. I was under no obligation to give a positive review. All opinions are on my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Fans of historical fiction will surely enjoy this intimate portrait of the daughters of famed painter Thomas Gainsborough, which has been crafted beautifully by author Emily Howes. This is not a lascivious or scintillating tale along the lines of the Historical Fan-Fic that is out there (a la the Real Housewives of Henry VIII), nor is there any overt violence or war. Instead, it's a quiet, atmospheric-- and occasionally too slow for my taste-- exploration of sisterhood and life as a woman in the era. There's a delicacy to the writing that mirrors the girls' mental states and helps set you as the reader in the period.

This is a voluntary review for a complimentary ARC kindly provided by NetGalley and the author/publisher.

This one was a struggle for me. It moves slow and left me wondering what the point of the story was. The emotional bond between the two sisters and their father came across, as did their lesser connection with their mother, but it left me flat. Someone used the word melancholy which I think perfectly describes this story.