The Windsor Affair - by Melanie Benjamin (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Feuding Windsor brothers and their wives--some things, it seems, never change. The Men Edward David Windsor, heir to the British throne, and George, his younger brother, "the spare." The Women Edward's wife Wallis, an American divorcée, and George's wife Elizabeth, descended from Scottish nobility. The Feud a rivalry that will last all their lives, make headlines, and still fuel gossip pages nearly a century later.

The Windsor Affair recreates the cataclysmic events that nearly toppled the monarchy and incited the power struggle between Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the queen-to-be, and Wallis Simpson, aka "That Woman," who fell into a calculated love affair with Prince Edward. Told from the perspective of both women, the novel propels readers into the fabulous world of the debonair Prince of Wales, café society of the 1930s, and the glittering private lives of the Windsors.

The first novel dedicated to the infamous rivalry between these two world-famous women, The Windsor Affair brings us all the gossip and intrigue between the two very different--yet perhaps more similar than they would admit--wives of royals. As Queen, Elizabeth would become the symbol of British pluck and courage during World War II and remain a British institution for the rest of her long life. Wallis would be forever forced to enact the World's Greatest Love Story even after it sours, as she goes from being admired to vilified and, ultimately, pitied.

Against the backdrop of the Abdication Crisis, World War II, coronations, funerals, births, and deaths, these two women maintain a bitter, biting, sharp-tongued feud--until age and the long arm of history bring about a kind of understanding. For the last communication between these bitter rivals was a simple, surprising message: "In friendship, Elizabeth."

About the Author