Quill & Quire called it "entertaining" but "overly theatrical",[4] while Kirkus Reviews said Buchanan's prose was "elegant", but limited by "sentimentality".

[5] Globe and Mail reviewer Judith Fitzgerald said "Few first novels exhibit the mastery, maturity and majesty of Buchanan's riveting fictional debut.

The Painted Girls is set in belle époque Paris and was inspired by the real-life model, Marie van Goethem, for Edgar Degas's c. 1880 statue Little Dancer of Fourteen Years and a notorious criminal trial of the era.

[7][8] Kirkus Reviews called it a "must-read", noting Buchanan's "masterful job" of weaving historical figures into the plot and her "moving yet unsentimental portrait" of familial love,[9] and The Washington Post's reviewer Susan Vreeland called it a "captivating story of fate, tarnished ambition and the ultimate triumph of sister-love.

[14] Publishers Weekly said it was "thoughtful, inventive historical fiction",[15] however Kirkus Reviews called it "unremarkable", devoting "many, many pages to worldbuilding, at the expense of advancing the narrative.