Customer Reviews

Diana: The Secret Years

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

An honest but compassionate view of Diana's strengths and weaknesses in her last years through the eyes of her former friend and "faith healer." While there may be less to Simmons' "powers" than meets the eye, she provides fairminded insight into Diana's quirks, insecurities and baffling behavior, allowing the reader to draw their own conclusions. Diana's periods of strength are poignant because she wasn't able to sustain them. Simmons reveals Diana was still cutting herself, making obsessive phone calls, undergoing colonic irrigation and seeking out faith healers late in life. Disturbing behind-the-scenes of the infamous Panorama interview and her obsessive and flighty behavior with men. Touching details of Diana's life with her sons, close friends, and her "truce" with Charles and Camilla. One feels sorry for a wonderful but troubled person spiraling out of control, and for the author, who was frozen out, as many of Diana's friends were, for confronting Diana with the truth.

I own practically every book ever written about Diana, Princess of Wales, but I think this has to be the most interesting account ever written. I loved it - it's very well-written, very insightful into her personality, and contains information I had never known before. It truly does explore "the secret years" of Diana's life in the 1990s. As a healer and close friend of Diana's, Simone Simmons had access to knowledge and personal details of Diana's life. But rather than seeing this account as a betrayal, I see it rather as a healer's insight into a unique personality. Much of what is written here is a healer's psychoanalysis of Diana's mind. I continue to be a great fan of Princess Diana's and am thrilled to have come across this book. You won't be able to put it down!

The Secret Years was a respectful portrayal of Diana's triumphs and trials, between her divorce and death.The book revealed the paranoia and mistrust Diana struggled with towards the end of her life; as-well-as the never ending love and service she gave to those in need. How like so many other individuals of noteriety through the centuries, her grandiose popularity not only had to hidden behind disguise, but added to the torment that continually plagued her. I believe Ms. Simmons depictions were written with sincerity. Confessing with sadness of the erosion of her relationship to Diana shortly before her death, left this close friend and comrade without the closure so many others were left with on August 31, 1997.

At first I thought this book would be another worshipful tome to Saint Diana. However, it quickly became apparent to me that Ms. Simmons wanted to tell it the way it was. She too describes the famous tantrums and mood swings that others have described. I must admit that I used to think that Diana was truly a wronged woman, but there are just too many people who agree that she had serious mental problems and was, at best, a difficult person to like. And this was written by a close friend! All in all, this was a very interesting book and I enjoyed reading it. However, when I finished this book, I realized I was glad I never had to put up with Diana or, god forbid, work for her!

What an under rated book this is. I've just finished reading it, after Paul Burrell's book in which he speaks so well of Miss Simmons' friendship with Princess Diana. Although I'd heard of the book, but not Ms. Simmons, I took Burrell's mention of her as a recommendation.

I was surprised that some of the so-called "new" revelations in our newspapers and on our TV, were first written about in this book which was published in 1998.

I found this a genuine and very warm account of a close personal friendship between the author and the Princess. I'm just sorry I never read this earlier.

I was full of anticipation when Diana: The Secret Years arrived in my mailbox. I was not disappointed.

This book provides firsthand detailed insight into the private life of a princess who captivated the hearts and imagination of people all over the world.

It gives those people a chance to know the human side -- imperfect as it maybe -- of this lovely human being.

Ironically enough though the only aspect of Diana's life that receives only a small mention in this book was the relationship that had the greatest impact on her life: her relationship with Dodi Fayed. This was rather disappointing because I thought this book would provide us with a close friend's views on such controversial relationship.

The lack of inside details about Diana's last affair was because the late princess had a fall-out with the writer a short time before she took off with Fayed. Unfortunately it was too late for them to make up.

This book tells us that indeed Diana was no saint; she had all the flaws of a human character. Yet deep inside she was a very kind, generous, thoughtful, caring and compassionate human being. May she rest in peace.

Simone, thank you for a very good book.

This may be to biography what PEOPLE magazine is to journalism, but I enjoyed it all the same. It is by no means definitive, nor does it pretend to be. It's the memories of a friend -- someone who actually knew who knew the POW, but knew her in a very narrow, particular way. The author keeps remind us of this throughout the book and I appreciated it. While it won't shed any light on who Diana the woman really was, I enjoyed the little details of what her every day, "off duty" life was like at KP.

I had vowed never to read, much less buy, another book about Diana, but I read the excerpts and decided I wanted to read more.

The author tells us about the problems Diana had in her everyday life in a matter-of-fact way. She is not overly sympathetic, but relates what happened. Unfortunately she was one of the friends/helpers Diana had turned away from by the time of her death and Ms. Simmons describes why. I think if the accident hadn't happened they'd have made up by now.

This book doesn't praise or bash a very sad and mixed-up young woman. I would recommend it to anyone interested in Diana.

This is a first-hand account of Princess Diana, a spectacular and enchanting woman who was loved by the world. This book portrays the real person behind the icon during the later years of her life. I think that most women (including my wife) can identify with Diana the real person; emotional, warm, loving and occasionally volatile, more so than they could identify with her as the icon. A gem of a book for Diana fans who really want to know the truth about her and her life.

When I first heard about this book I thought what a load of rubbish, but since it has been written, far too many people have come forward and confirmed everything that Ms. Simmons had been the first to write about. Leading world figures and close friends of Diana have spoken out in TV interviews and other books about the Princess, which now gives this book total credibility and shows it to be 100% truthful. All the facts about Diana's private life have been revealed here and it's very sad that so few people appreciated this book when it was first written.

The fact is that this book is the story of a friendship between two women who shared many emotional experiences, helped each other and grew together - despite obvious class differences. The way in which Ms. Simmons remembers Diana is very touching indeed. She was obviously a true friend whom I believe Diana did ask to write a book and "tell it like it is".