A Right Royal Face Off

'A glorious comedy of painting and pretensions' - Ryan O'Neill, `A laugh-out-loud contemporary satire married with a tale of vicious rivalry in the world of 18th-century royal portraiture' - Liz Trenow, `I enjoyed this beguiling book very much. The interwoven strands between 1780s and the 2010s are beautifully managed and brilliantly resolved' - Hugh Belsey

A literary comedy about the 18th-century rivalry between Thomas Gainsborough and Sir Joshua Reynolds for the affections of the Royal Family. Meanwhile, in the present day, a picture which may or may not be a long-lost Gainsborough turns up on a TV antiques show being filmed in SuffolkIt is 1777, and England's second-greatest portrait artist, Thomas Gainsborough, has a thriving practice a stone's thrown from London's royal palaces. Meanwhile, the press talks up his rivalry with Sir Joshua Reynolds, the pedantic theoretician who is the top dog of British portraiture. Fonder of the low life than high society, Gainsborough loathes pandering to grand sitters, but he changes his tune when he is commissioned to paint King George III and his large family. In their final, most bitter competition, who will be chosen as court painter, Tom or Sir Joshua? Two and a half centuries later, a badly damaged painting turns up on a downmarket TV antiques show being filmed in Suffolk. Could the monstrosity really be, as its eccentric owner claims, a Gainsborough? If so, who is the sitter? And why does he have donkey's ears? Mixing ancient and modern as he did in his acclaimed debut The Hopkins Conundrum, Simon Edge takes aim at fakery and pretension in this highly original celebration of one of our greatest artists.