Ever After: Diana and the Life She Led

A prominent writer of celebrity bios (Katherine Hepburn, Judy Garland, etc.), Edwards takes on the storied life of Princess Diana. This intensely absorbing account nevertheless fails to reveal any major new information about the famous princess. Drawing on archival as well as published materials about Diana and her family--as well as hundreds of interviews, including one with Andrew Morton, author of Diana: Her True Story--Edwards recounts the familiar story of Diana's unhappy childhood, spent with divorced parents, and of her essentially loveless marriage to Prince Charles. Her early life was so troubled, according to Edwards, that Diana's poor performance in school was probably related to emotional distress rather than inability. Although Diana's well-publicized eating disorders began before her marriage, Edwards describes how evidence of Charles's continued affection for his former mistress, Camilla Parker-Bowles, triggered Diana's continued attacks of bulimia during her honeymoon and while she was pregnant with William. After the birth of her second child, Harry, Diana's intimate life with Charles virtually ended, and he spent his free time with Camilla. Although Edwards acknowledges Diana's emotional problems, this account is far more sympathetic to the unhappy princess than Sally Bedell Smith's Diana in Search of Herself. The author even credits Diana, in death, with changing the Windsors' attitudes toward their subjects, because the queen was forced, by public pressure, to share in the national outpouring of grief. Diana's many fans are sure to be delighted by Edwards's intimate prose and detailed descriptions. Author tour. (May)