New Royal book Power and the Palace released

A new royal book is released today (11 September) which explores the often secretive and little understood relationship between the monarchy of the last 200 years and the government of the time. Power and the Palace: The Inside Story of the Monarchy and 10 Downing Street, is written by a former royal correspondent Valentine Low.

The book, which has already made headlines from the few excerpts allowed into press early, reaches into the mysterious power dynamic between the royals and the world of politics and is based on nearly 100 interviews with senior politicians, top civil servants, royal aides, and constitutional experts.

The reader is taken behind the scenes of the weekly audience that the sovereign and prime minister still hold to present day and is described as a “highly revelatory account” which includes many moments of dramatic tension.

In over 400 fascinating pages the author makes countless claims and uncovers some intriguing findings from Queen Victoria to King Charles III, including some remarkable interactions involving Queen Elizabeth II and several of her PM’s. 

The late Queen’s political leanings will probably surprise many, as in public at least, she was strictly impartial. Sources apparently were able to inform Low of how behind closed doors she was far more politically outspoken, often being extremely forthright in her opinion of certain individuals and what she actually thought about things going on in the country.

The book tells of how she was also instinctively against the upheaval of Brexit with a feature that details a conversation between her and a minister during which she reportedly was insistent that the country should not leave the EU and is quoted as saying “it’s better to stick with the devil you know.”

There are engrossing passages that indicate how she had very good relationships with Harold Wilson and John Major, but there was much more tension when it came to her dealings with Margaret Thatcher.

After Queen Elizabeth’s death the book reveals how it was the government who wanted to showcase the Coronation of King Charles III in 2023. The Palace was said to be wary of anything too ostentatious when people were struggling to pay their bills and would have been happy with a cut-price ceremony, but were guided by Downing Street to make it a spectacle with a “maximalist” approach. In the end the Coronation cost some £72m.

Other enlightening chapters divulge how the present Queen Camilla fought off a sexual assault by whacking the perpetrator “in the nuts with the heel of my shoe”, in an incident that took place on a train to London when she was a teenager back in the 1960’s.

There will be hope that this book does not attract as much controversy as Endgame, a royal book written by Omid Scobie, a 42-year-old British journalist based in the US, and released in 2023. 

That publication had a Dutch translation suggesting that King Charles III and Catherine, Princess of Wales, were the two people who questioned the colour of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s unborn baby, sparking racism allegations at that time. 

That claim was denied by the author who said at the time what transpired in the Netherlands was simply “an error” although the translator of the book said she had simply translated what she was given.

Whilst many critics will argue that any publicity is good publicity, it is likely that Valentine Low will hope his book will be greeted more favourably by the Royals.