Book and Video Reviews, J-S

Book Reviews, J-S: includes reviews on Kay Kellam's novel A Life to Di For, Sharyn McCrumb's short story "The Monster of Glamis", The Bodyguard's Story by Trevor Reese-Jones, Ingrid Seward's The Queen and Di, Diana in Search of Herself  by Sally Bedell Smith, and
Althorp: the Story of an English House by Charles Spencer.

Kay Kellam--A Life to Di For (novel)

Kay Kellam's A Life to Di For is both a science fiction novel, since it involves time travel,
and a mystery because the heroine is trying to find out what happened in the tunnel by becoming part of Diana's life from the time she was an unknown young nursery school teacher. At first she intends just to drop in at various intervals, but she finds herself eventually living in the past, first because she she is caught up in Diana's story and later because she is attracted to a photographer who covers the royal beat. She finally learns the real fate of Diana and Dodi, but at the same time she also uncovers a stunning surprise about the man she loves. This novel is highly appealing for
a number of reasons: first, its portrait of Diana is the one we like to think we would have known
if we had been her best friend--charming, compassionate, thoughtful, and an ability to see the best in people and events and have a sense of humor even if things in her personal life were rotten. Both the heroine and her boyfriend are engaging enough that we want to know what happens to them in the future (which is good because the author intends to use them in later novels), and the story itself is so compelling that you won't put it down till it's finished. What's more, it doesn't have any loose ends or implausible motives or events. It reminds me very much of Jack Finney's time travel books, but you don't have to be a fan of such books to enjoy it. If I was writing this review for Amazon, I would give it five stars. (Originally appeared October 31, 1999.)

Sharyn McCrumb--"The Monster of Glamis" (short story)

One short story that you may not be aware of is Sharyn McCrumb's "The Monster of Glamis",
which was originally written for inclusion in Royal Crimes (1994), a paperback anthology in
which each story has real royals from over the centuries acting as sleuths or perpetrators.
The story is told in the form of a letter written by Diana to her son Wills in 1992, with the intention that he will read it some years hence after he becomes King and will be in a position to resolve a crime that she is certain has occurred against the Duchess of York. To tell more would give away too much of the plot, but I will tell you it is quite humorous and McCrumb obviously admires Princess Diana, since she captures her personality quite well. Fortunately she reprinted it within a collection of her own work titled Foggy Mountain Breakdown and Other Stories (1997), which is also available in paperback. It's quite likely you may find her book at your local public library since her two mystery series are quite popular. (Note: another royal-themed work of Ms. McCrumb's is The Windsor Knot, an entry in the Elizabeth MacPherson series in which Elizabeth, who is about to marry a native of Scotland, is researching royal weddings for her own marriage, which she has prevailed upon her groom to move up so as his wife she can attend a garden party at Buckingham Palace.) (Originally appeared April 1, 2000.)

Trevor Reese-Jones--The Bodyguard's Story

The Bodyguard's Story is a significant work because it offers a quite different perspective on the
relationship between the couple and the causes of the accident than the one presented by Death of
a Princess (1998), which was heavily influenced by Mohammed Al-Fayed. It exposes flaws and
fear within the organization structure and notes breakdowns in communication, all of which were key factors in causing the crash. It also dispels some myths that have grown up around the couple and the accident, such as:

                  Did Dodi and Diana really select a ring in Monte Carlo
                  Was Trevor Rees-Jones wearing a seat belt
                  The source of the carbon dioxide in Henri Paul's blood
                  What did Trevor Rees-Jones remember about the accident

It also gives in unflinching detail the injuries and surgeries he suffered, which were so horrific that
it is truly miraculous he survived and that surgeons were able to reconstruct his face. Unlike
James Hewitt's book, this book reflects his level-headed awareness that the only reason that people are interested in him is just because of Princess Diana; and the book reflects that in having only a small amount of information about his life before the first trip with the Princess and her sons, as well as telling it in the third person, so it could incorporate material from Kes Wingfield (the other bodyguard on duty in Paris), his mother, his stepfather, and others. It leaves the reader heartily in sympathy with his desire to tell the tale in order to get it over with and to try to accumulate a little money for the legal bills and the health problems he may eventually face, and then go on with his life.  (Originally appeared April 1, 2000)

Ingrid Seward--The Queen and Di

I have mixed feelings about Ingrid Seward's The Queen and Di, which was published last year in Britain and was published in February in the US. On one hand, it is ground-breaking because it examines the relationship between the Queen and Princess Diana to an extent that no previous book has done, and drawn parallels to various aspects of their upbringing and experience not noted before, especially in the chapters "Childhood Comparisons" and "Adulation"; and she correctly pinpoints the crucial factor for Diana's obsession with Camilla beginning with Diana being naive enough to ask how she compared with Prince Charles' other girlfriends, and him being stupid enough to answer the question honestly.  But on the other hand, as a long-time reader of this site commented when he said why he had stopped reading Majesty magazine, "Now that Diana is no longer around to fatten the profits of Majesty, they have obviously sold out to Prince Charles' camp. " (But some of this sniping on the part of the magazine was occurring before her death, since I recently ran across a passage in an issue published in 1996 that I recognized as being in this book.) She repeats Sally Bedell Smith's allegation that Diana suffered from Borderline Personality Disorder (which was not original with Smith, since as far as I know it first appeared in Chris Hutchins' 1996 book, Diana on the Edge: Inside the Mind of the Princess of Wales), but Seward proceeds to outdo Smith by attacking Diana's relationship with her children: "Charles was bemused and at times concerned about Diana's emotionally suffocating relationship with William and Harry," (P. 117) and Seward also attacked Diana's parenting style in the opening chapter dealing with Diana's death: "In her determination to ensure that they should enjoy as normal an upbringing as possible, Diana sometimes inadvertently led them in directions which went against their natural inclinations" (P. 18), such as shooting and stalking in Scotland, "and he (William) was starting to find the programme of entertainments his mother insisted on organizing for him increasingly irksome" (P. 18). Seward also gives insight why the courtiers and the aristocracy have treated her with disdain when she comments, "It is an intriguing commentary on her life that while she enjoyed great popularity with the general public, those of her own class saw her as spoilt, wilful, irresponsible, and a threat to the institution she had married into--and treated her accordingly" (p. 126). In many respects, this book is a greater threat to Diana's reputation than Smith's book is because Smith did her biography, and then moved on to other topics, whereas Seward has been associated with Majesty for many years and has written other books on royalty, so her background gives her a great deal more authority and credibility. What's worse, she evidently had access to documents such as private letters of Prince Charles to his friends which she quotes in her text and less implicitly, the notes of the police detail who guarded Charles and Diana, since she states that they show that "Charles did not spend any significant amount of time alone  with Camilla" until 1986 (P. 130) and "that in 1985 Princess Diana was often behind closed doors, and alone with a man who was not her husband" (Sergeant Barry Mannakee, her protection officer, P. 131). Personally, I am ashamed to have enriched her by buying this book, but if you still want to read it, then get it from the public library, or wait till it gets remaindered, or buy it second-hand, so you won't give her a cent in royalties! (Originally appeared May 6, 2001.)

Sally Bedell Smith--Diana: in Search of Herself

According to its book jacket, Sally Bedell Smith's Diana: in Search of Herself is the "first
authoritative biography", "insightful" and the "first truly balanced portrait" by a writer who
"had few preconceived ideas" (p.3) about Diana. Please! If this is an example of an unbiased
writer, then give me Lady Colin Campbell (The Real Diana) or Penny Junor (Charles: Victim or
Villain?) any day, because you know where their allegiance lies and their most recent books did
not sell as widely as this one will. What's more, they at least admitted that Diana had some good
qualities, whereas this book is probably the cruelest book yet published about Diana because it
dwells obsessively on her problems. The borderline personality bombshell in the last chapter is
not new; Chris Hutchins dwelt on it in more detail in his book, Diana on the Edge: Inside the
Mind of the Princess of Wales (1996) and he also presented a whole laundry list of other possible
psychiatric disorders from which she may have suffered, which he determined by talking to
psychiatrists, none of whom had met her. If you haven't already bought or read the Smith book,
pass it by, since it will only make you angry or upset. Another reason I dislike it is because I don't
believe in the "let it all hang out" school of biography. I think it is terribly demeaning to dwell at
length on the negative aspects of a subject's personality, such as marital fights, temper tantrums,
weeping spells (how come swollen eyes don't seem apparent in the thousands of pictures we've all
seen of Diana), and broken friendships. If you have read this book, then I suggest counteracting it
with Julie Burchill's Diana (1998). Burchill is credited with originating the phrase "The People's
Princess" back in the 1980s and she writes with love and compassion for her subject, and a wicked
wit for anyone who wronged Diana, skewering Charles and his family as well as lambasting the
aristocracy for its neglect in educating its daughters. (Orginally appeared September 10, 1999.)

Charles Spencer--Althorp: the Story of an English House

On many occasions when she felt nervous, Princess Diana would calm herself by saying,
"Remember, Diana, you're a Spencer." Why she said that instead of saying, "Remember, Diana,
you're the Princess of Wales", may become more obvious once you've read Charles Spencer's
book,  Althorp: the Story of an English House. This book is very commendable for two reasons:
first, because he resisted the temptation to make it a runaway best-seller by putting more about
Diana in the book. (She only appears in the last few pages where he talks about the alterations
which were made before opening the estate for the July-August visits.) Second, he does not
pretend to be a scholar, but instead talks to the reader in a chatty, informal way, much as he must
have done when he was a teen aged guide taking tourists through the house in the 1970s. We learn
about the family's services to Crown and country (though he is largely silent about all those
Spencer gels who were royal mistresses) and such illustrious guests as King Charles I and Empress
Elisabeth of Austria, two of whose equestrienne portraits still grace the walls. Over the years--and
this was even before the reign of Raine--many treasures, such as a Holbein portrait of Henry VIII
and the largest private library in Europe, had to be sold to keep the heirs solvent. As a form of
stewardship to keep the place intact for future generations, it was Charles' grandfather who began
opening the house to the public for tours in the fifties, though he was highly contemptuous of
average day-trippers due to their ignorance about the items which they were seeing. His son
Johnnie expanded on this after Diana's marriage by offering dinners with an Earl at 50 pounds
a head, as well as opening a gift shop and a wine shop. When Charles inherited the place, he
developed it as a site for hosting conferences and workshops throughout the year, and the
July-August opening to the public is merely a continuation of the 60 days each year that they
were previously open to the public. It is a heritage that Diana was right to be proud of and it is
entertainingly and beautifully presented in this moderately priced volume. (Which is another
reason I like it--he could have made it into one of those oversized coffee table books at twice the
price.) (Orginally appeared September 10, 1999.)
 

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This site originally launched July 1, 1999                           This page launched August 31, 2003.