Beautifully written . . . I raced through it' HILARY MANTEL 1759 Ipswich. Sisters Peggy and
Molly Gainsborough are the best of friends and do everything together. They spy on their father
as he paints they rankle their mother as she manages the books they tear barefoot through the
muddy fields that surround their home. But there is another reason they are inseparable: from a
young age Molly has had a tendency to forget who she is to fall into mental confusion and
Peggy knows instinctively that no one must find out. When the family move to Bath the sisters
are thrown into the whirl of polite society where the merits of marriage and codes of
behaviour are crystal clear and secrets much harder to keep. As Peggy goes to greater lengths
to protect her sister from the threat of an asylum she finds herself falling in love and
their precarious situation is soon thrown catastrophically off course. The discovery of a
betrayal forces Peggy to question all she has done for Molly - and whether any one person can
truly change the fate of another.
