1 comments about Elizabeth: The Scandalous Life of the Duchess of Kingston.

1. I was surprised that the editorial reviews consider this a "fascinating" and "delightful" story. I did not find it so in the least. Basically, young Miss Chudleigh impulsively elopes with Augustus Hervey and soon afterwards they part for good. Many years later she marries the Duke of Kingston without divorcing Hervey basically to avoid the scandal of divorce. The "highlight" of the book is her trial for bigamy, more than 35 years after leaving Hervey and some years after the Duke's death (the charge initiated by the Duke's disinherited nephew). Before and after her conviction, the story concentrates on her legal problems, her travels and her interest in buying up property -- I could barely slog through the second half of the book and admit to skimming some of it.
   
   I am very interested in 18th century English history and have read all the popular history I could find, especially biographies of fashionable ladies like the Duchess of Devonshire, Mrs. Fitzherbert, Mrs. Jordan, Countess of Bessborough, Lady Caroline Lamb, among others. All were fascinating women. Elizabeth, Duchess of Kingston, bigamist or not (really, who cares?), is not nearly in the same league.

No comments about The Diaries of Lady Anne Clifford.

1 comments about Elizabeth I (Very Interesting People Series).

1. This entry into OUP's VIP series is an solid introduction to the life of Elizabeth I, Virgin Queen, Glorianna. I consider myself an armchair historian of all things British and have read many a book about Good Queen Bess. Whilst I enjoyed its brevity--it also included some details to entice more-knowledgable persons--I disagreed with a few of Collinson's views. He doesn't seem to give Elizabeth credit: he depicts an Elizabethan England dominated by a commonwealth system and a very bossy parliament. While parliament was gaining its preeminence, the Queen was still indeed the Queen and he did not acknowledge that. He also appeared to disagree with himself: he quotes Cecil describing Elizabeth as a "commander" then backtracks and says Cecil may have been the brains behind the reign, more or less. However, the book's strongpoints are the inclusions of many notable people, and some unremembered. I enjoyed hearing the names of courtiers and others and learning what their duties were and their relationship to Elizabeth. I didn't expect detail from such a small volume so it was very much appreciated. I also found no error in his sense of the timeline--no events were mis-dated. Collinson's passion is for the Reformation in England and I enjoyed his knowledge and insight about everything from the Vestment Controversy to well-known events like the Act of Supremacy. On the whole, this was a superb introduction to Elizabeth, or a good refresher as I used it, and is worth its price and then some.

5 comments about Ever After: Diana and the Life She Led.

1. Enjoy reading books, in general, of people who actually lived. Enjoy reading
   of Diana and her life by respectable, intelligent authors who actually know what they are trying to have us know of. Enjoyed it immensely.



2. I'm currently enrolled in a course on writing biographies, taught by Anne Edwards at the UCLA Extension Program. On the first day of the course the author brought an assorted copies of some of the 24 books that she's written over the years and we were each asked to choose one to read during the ten-week course. I read a lot of biographies but I had never yet read one of Anne's. Though I am a bit of a self-confessed Anglophile, "Ever After, Diana and the Life she Led" wouldn't have naturally been my first choice. Most of the others were already taken however, and Anne suggested that I might enjoy reading this one.
   
   The tragic death of Princess Diana is one of those moments in one's life where were one knows exactly the instant that one heard the heartbreaking news.
   
   I'm quite pleased indeed that this was the one she suggested. I found Edwards writing style very engaging and though cliché or not, I found the book very difficult to put down. I enjoyed it immensely. Edwards has a way of recreating the feeling of the moment exactly as when it occurred. She has a talent of bringing in all of the senses so that you really feel that you are there, standing in the moment. "Park House, Diana's home, was a ten-bedroom Victorian country house with staff cottages, stables and a tennis court. Although it was four miles inland, easterly winds brought the scent of salt to remind the occupants of the area's seafaring history."
   
   I found it thoroughly enjoyable, so much so, that I've decided to order a number of Edwards other books from here on Amazon.



3. I also wrote a research project on Princess Diana, and i used this book. It was so helpful and i really learned a lot. All of the other books i had read, by her butler and things, were more about THEIR life, not Diana's.



4. If you love Diana, you will love this book. I did a research paper on Diana, and this book was great help. The discriptions of every event in the book is amazing. I could not put the book down.



5. Anne Edwards does an exquisite job at portraying the life of Princess Diana. This novel takes the reader through Diana's rough childhood, family background, marriage to Prince Charles, public work, divorce and her death in 1997. The book takes the reader by surprise because many people saw Diana's life as a fairytale, but learn through the novel that Diana's life was not as perfect as it seemed to be. Readers will learn a great deal about the life story of Princess Diana. This novel is appropriate for young adults to grownup.

2 comments about Princess in Love.

1. Actor Patrick Macnee reads the audio book version of the royal affair between Diana and James Hewitt, which is based on his interviews. Diana's marriage had already dissolved and she was insecure and needy when she met the handsome army captain who became her riding instructor. According to the book, Diana fairly pounced on the innocent young man and enticed him into a relationship; he was happy to "do his duty to crown and country" by giving her the unconditional love and support she craved. The affair lasted for years and when they broke up, he was devastated. (No mention is made of his selling his story to the media and going public with her love letters.)
   
   Fans of Diana will probably not learn anything new here, but it is the mellifluous voice of Patrick Macnee, brimming with fatherly pride when describing Hewitt's honor, mournfully describing the tragic parting, and lingering joyfully over the passionate passages that makes this worth listening to. Every sentence is filled with effusive, bodice-ripping melodrama and Macnee clearly loves every minute of it.
   
   Since this is based solely on Hewitt's account, he comes off as a romantic hero while Diana is the relentless aggressor who ensnares him into committing treason. No matter; it's a hoot.



2. James Hewitt wrote a book about his relationship with the deceased Princess Diana in 1992 about their affair that lasted from 1985 to 1991. It is an romantic and interesting story that people who love gossippy things. I found it passionately fastinating.

4 comments about Diana: The Last Days.

1. This is the book that finally shows the Diana/Dodi murder and conspiracy stories to be what they are - complete figments of the imaginations of Mohamed Fayed and his minions. Mr Gregory had access to Diana's friends and the bodyguards who shared her final vacation with Dodi Fayed, and with their help he sheds the true light on the relationship. Why would anyone want to murder them when the relationship hadn't even lasted for 2 months and gave no indication that it would lead to marriage? And who would choose a car accident to commit murder when it's the most inefficient way of killing, since we have no control over the laws of physics which govern car accidents? I commend the author for having the courage and common sense to write this book, since he, and I, seem to believe that some people would see sinister conspiracy plots in 2 people planning to go grocery shopping together.



2. I'm really sorry to say this and I hope you don't take offence, but there's only one word in the English language that most precisely describes people like Martyn Gregory: propagandist.



3. As far as Princess Diana books go, this one is as wrongful as you can get ... the reporting is fundamentally flawed. Like the French authorities, Mr Gregory is willing to declare the Earth is flat and more nonsense in the desperate attempt to keep the lid on this cover-up.

   Judging from statements and the relief expressed by some British politicians, the death was needed to save the throne. Diana and Dodi had become a threat to the British establishment. The scenario opening in front of their horrified eyes was of a possible marriage to an Egyptian playboy. It was unthinkable that the heir to the throne and his younger brother should have a Muslim stepfather. It was equally unthinkable that the union might produce an Anglo/Egyptian half-brother for the royal princes.

   British Intelligence, under their rules, was "justified" in wiping these people out for the purposes of the monarchy, protection of the realm, and "national security."




4. Those who seek the truth should ignore anything Gregory says about Diana/Dodi. Gregory is associated with Dominic Lawson, editor of the Sunday Telegraph, who has been named in the House of Commons as an agent for British intelligence.

1 comments about The Man Who Had Been King: The American Exile of Napoleon's Brother Joseph.

1. This is a first-rate biography that is an excellent follow-on to Stroud's book about Napoleon's nephew, Charles-Lucien Bonaparte (The Emperor of Nature). Stroud has been a biographer of natural historians (another was of Thomas Say, the first American naturalist), but this sojourn into the American exile of Napoleon's older brother Joseph, an aristocrat and former king of Naples and Spain, proves a good fit for her.
   
   One suspects Stroud was drawn to Joseph's story in part because he made his large estate in southern New Jersey into a vast private nature reserve, in which he enriched the natural stock by introducing species from his much-missed Europe, including hares and Osage orange trees. Stroud throws in amusing
   anecdotes about encounters with wildlife: Charles-Lucien, newly arrived from Italy, once gleefully leaps off his horse to grab a beautiful black-and-white creature scurrying along the ground -- only to get sprayed by a skunk.
   
   But Stroud doesn't dwell on the natural history but rather on the rich aristocratic life of Joseph in America, who built one of the country's finest art collections at the time. Stroud makes it clear that the degree to which Joseph influenced the advancement of high European culture in this country, which today reveals itself in great private and public art and library collections, magnificent gardens, and grand estates, was significant. His library, for one, had more volumes than the Library of Congress.
   
   Joseph, a sensitive sophisticate who seems to be the polar opposite of his willful, deeply egotistical younger brother, comes across as a highly likable fellow who is at once an expatriate playboy and a partisan utterly committed to restoring a Bonaparte to the throne of France. His exile in America, which lasts 17 years, makes for a good story, and Stroud tells it with verve, intelligence, and an easygoing yet authoritative style that should appeal to both lay and scholarly readers. I particularly enjoyed her sense of humor: there's one scene of Joseph confronting Napoleon in the bathtub about the Louisiana Purchase that should not be missed.

5 comments about God Save the Queen?: Monarchy and the Truth About the Windsors.

1. This book is very well written. It is like he is talking to me in person. He is, I feel, a little bit too harsh on the Queen but right on about Philip, Charles and the Queen Mother and Margaret. A good book.



2. I purchased this book in the hopes that I might learn more about some of the contemporary issues/public opinion surrounding the monarchy of the United Kingdom. I was horribly disappointed. Quotes taken out of context, unattributed quotes, and silly gossip form the basis for a nasty polemic. This is the kind of distortion one probably should expect from an acolyte for republicanism. It is not the kind of book, however, that anyone interested in serious discussion about the monarchy would want to waste his/her money on. It is so unbalanced a perspective, that even those few positive contributions the author feels forced to cite during his diatribe are attributed not to generosity of spirit but to psychological disorder. It is sad that this kind of royal character asassination does not still carry a penalty of some time in the Tower.



3. Johann Hari is one of Britain's most distinguished journalists and has won loads of awards - all deserved! This book shows why he is so acclaimed. I loved its mix of gossip, political wisdom, and intellect. I cannot imagine anybody but the most crazy monarchist disliking it (and even they would have to admit there's some great anecdotes here...)
   
   (by the way, the other commenters here on this book seem to be slightly insane. An EU coup in Britain? Uh... yeah...)



4. Mr Hari is inded a 'non-journalist', as John Pilger describes him. He is arrogant, ignorant and pompous beyond his years. It's no surprise that the reactionary Trotskyite and Bush-loving fool Christopher Hitchens likes him. This damns them both! Hari hates the British royal family and wants to get rid of them in order to make it easier for Tony Blair to abolish Britain's sovereignty and make us a province of a new undemocratic state called Europe. This would open the door for Blair to become President not just of Britain but of Europe. A new Pope, indeed!



5. I laughed so hard my gut ached when I read this book. It is a witty, extremely well-researched investigation into the monarchy, both intellectually stimuling and filled with gossip. The reviews were right. This is a must-read.

No comments about Henry VII (Routledge Historical Biographies).

5 comments about The Camera and the Tsars: The Romanov Family in Photographs.

1. The photographs included are absolutely amazing, most of which I had never seen before. If your interest in the Romanov Dynasty extends beyond Emperor Nicholas II, his wife and children, then this book is definitely for you. That said, the author relentlessly uses the title of "Grand Prince/ss" instead of Grand Duke/Duchess, which just grated on my very last nerve by the middle of the first section. If you can look beyond that, you're in for a wonderful treat.



2. When I ordered The Camera and the Tsars: A Romanov Family Album by Charlotte Zeepvat from Amazon, I assumed that this book was primarily personal photographs taken by Tsar Nicholas II and his family. I was happy to discover how wrong I was! The Camera and the Tsars is a beautiful book that chronicles the lives of the Imperial Family in photographs, starting with Nicholas I. As Zeepvat writes, "by the mid-1850s the imperial family and the camera had embarked on a long and fruitful relationship." What makes this book a true treasure is that most of these stunning pictures have never before been published.
   
   The Camera and the Tsars details not just the immediate family, but extended family as well. The author breaks the photos down into 12 chapters, including The Family, Born Romanov, The Family at Work, The Family at Play, and Marrying into the Family. Many of the photos are extremely rare, including one taken of the ladies of the court for the coronation of Nicholas II, a death-bed scene of Nicholas I, and a wedding photo of Grand Duchess Elizabeth, wife of Konstantin (Russian wedding photos weren't usually taken in the 19th Century). The pictures of family gatherings (with family members from all the Royal Houses of Europe) are fascinating. The Camera and the Tsars includes more pictures of Empress Alexandra smiling than in all the other books I've ever seen combined. And the photos of her immediate family (the last Tsar) will haunt the reader. The later Romanov's were shutterbugs and some of the photos are credited to them. But most are done by professionals and are works of art. Even today, photographs continue to be discovered after being "lost" for so many years.
   
   My one complaint about Camera of the Tsars is that the author includes detailed narratives about the subjects in the photos, but she tries to put her own spin on things. I have always read that Grand Duke Sergei and his wife, Elizabeth of Hesse had a troubled marriage and that Sergei was a very difficult man. Zeepvat claims this perception was orchestrated by family members who disliked Sergei, and that "private letters now coming to light" prove that Elizabeth's marriage was not "one long martyrdom." Unfortunately, Zeepvat does not provide us with the source of this "new" information.
   I think that the author should have stuck with descriptions and omitted her interpretations in a book of this nature.
   
   Still, The Camera of the Tsars is an interesting book (especially for any serious Romanov collector), and provides a unique look into their very privileged world.



3. I loved this book. It had many pictures I had never seen before.



4. This is an excellent book for anyone interested in the Romanovs. It has many unpublished photographs and draws upon newly discovered family correspondence that debunks many long-held perspectives that almost always originated from the very few family members who published autobiographies in English--and seem to blame certain family members for their unhappiness in their own lives or needed to sell books. For instance, Grand Duchess Ella & Grand Duke Serge had a deeply connected marriage and profound love for one another--their marriage was never an empty sham as others later claimed, Ella was a deeply loved woman by everyone who knew her and her niece Marie's savage references to her seem to be a way to blame her Aunt for her own father's desertion of her family because she could not bear to blame him directly, Grand Duchess Marie chose to marry a Prince of Sweden on her own and was never forced to marry him, Grand Duchess Olga chose to marry Duke Peter of Oldenburg and her mother was as surprised as everyone else by her choice given Peter's reputation, etc. And equally interesting is the focus on other, barely-known branches of the family and their lives and accomplishments.
   
   And just a note--as a Russian I can tell you that for reasons that are not entirely clear, the term Grand Duke/Grand Duchess is a mis-translation in English and French of the Russian title Grand Prince/Grand Princess that dates back to when Peter the Great first created the title...and it seems that Russian Grand Princes of the time traveling in England and France were fine being referred as Grand Dukes. Grand Prince and Grand Princess is the direct translation from Russian to English, and the translation from Russian to German also distinguishes between Grand Prince/Grand Princess, and the German title Gross Herzog which translates directly into English as Grand Duke. Grand Dukes existed only in Germany and Luxembourg and were sovereigns that ranked below Kings and above reigning Dukes. Grand Princes/Grand Princesses existed only in Russia and were of "Imperial" rank...although they were not reigning sovereigns. There seems to be an effort underway to correct this historic and centuries-old mis-translation, but it is of minor historical importance.



5. I do not have much to add to my review that hasn't been said by the other reviewers. However, Zeepvat refers throughout the book to the members of the Russuan royal family as 'Grand Prince' and 'Grand Princess'! In all my extensive readings of the Romanovs I have never seen anything but 'Grand Duke' or 'Grand Duchess', indeed, this is how certain family members referred to themselves in their memoirs. That said, this is still a wonderful book to add to any royal collection.