Customer Reviews

Ever After: Diana and the Life She Led

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It was so refreshing to finally read a book that didn't bash Diana, but told it like it really was. It showed how she really felt about all that was going on in her life, and how she tried to handle it the best way she knew how. The author showed a love for Diana that I have not seen in any other book, but at the same time she didn't play favorites. She showed kindness to Charles as well. I am so very glad that Anne Edwards has written this book. It shows there are people out there who love the Princess and admire all the good that she has done.

I was an admirer of the late Princess but, unlike many other people I know, in no way could I be considered a "Di-junkie." I make this distinction only to show that I am not indiscriminate in my fascination with the poor woman. As a result, I have not read most of the slightly hysterical Di biographies, and I have been offended by the few that I did read. Still, I do have a certain curiosity about what really went on behind the poised and gracious facade of the public Diana. Here, Anne Edwards has written the definitive work, scholarly to be sure, addressing the Princess of Wales as an author would any other historical figure. According to her own notes, Ms. Edwards began this project before the Princess' sudden death. The book is detailed and filled a multitude of exactly the kind of facts that are valuable to anyone with a background in historic research. There is a thorough explanation of who the very sweet and young noblewoman was in terms of her own family's prestigious history and expectations. The clear conclusion is that this innocent girl was used, callously and deliberately, to satisfy both the breeding needs and the media relations requirements of the Royal family. Yet at no time does Ms. Edwards appear partisan toward Diana, nor does she engage in imaginative psychobabble to attempt to understand what made the much-loved (by everyone except her ex-husband and his family!) Diana tick. The result is a book which is the Diana resource that historians will rely on in centuries to come. I look forward to reading other works by Ms. Edwards.

This is a wonderful book and I highly recommend it. Just wanted to let other Diana readers/book collectors know that this book was published last year in England under the title, Diana and the Rise of the Spencers. I did not know that and now have two copies.

This is one of the best of the Diana biographies I've read. It's easy reading, yet goes into more detail about her family history, her childhood and her dysfunctional family. One can understand her need for love and acceptance after knowing what she went through growing up and also understand why she feared she would lose custody of her children the way her mother had lost custody of her, her sisters and brother.

My first thought upon hearing about this book..there goes another trashing of Diana..It was about this time last year the bashing started..I suppose to keep the people away from the palace and hopefully dim the love they feel for this inspiring woman..something they know nothing about..So little inspirational has come from there for so long..until Diana. I was so overjoyed and touched to see how this author wrote as if it was comming from Diana..the author was fair to both Diana and Charles..but at the same time..the portrait of Diana..is painted with loving brush strokes..I couldn't wait to finish it..then read it again...Thank you Anne Edwards..this book will remain in my heart for a long time...maybe ever after...

Unless you're a diehard Diana fan collecting every book about her, I'd pass on this one. It has an eye-catching cover but little else to recommend it. With such a deluge of material on Diana, the only useful biographies at this time would be ones that show her in a new light or place her in a scholarly, historic context. One that does the former quite well, even if you disagree with the premise, is Diana In Search of Herself, by Sally Bedell Smith, who carefully substantiates her claims.

Anne Edwards, on the other hand, offers a regurgitation of the same well-known facts about Diana that most of her fans are already privy to. She is pro-Diana, ignoring the complicated and sometimes manipulative relationship Diana engaged in with the press and focusing a very flattering light on Dodi Fayed, despite what is clearly known about his lifestyle and treatment of women other than Diana. She makes broad claims about Diana that she doesn't substantiate. Writing of her last dinner at the Ritz, she states "since the divorce her bulimia had disappeared." This subtly blames Charles for Diana's eating disorder and contradicts carefully presented evidence to the contrary in Bedell Smiths' book.

Edwards feels compelled, toward the end of her book, to try to place Diana in some historical context, but she does so in a way that is hardly profound: "Her achievement was that she could make people feel better." Unless you must have absolutely everything written about Diana, make your wallet feel better and skip this one.

Edwards is a highly respected biographer and I thought it would be as well researched as her other work on Queen Mary, Elizabeth and Margaret, Vivien Leigh and Katharine Hepburn. This volume seems considerably smaller, perhaps the subject had a life considerably shorter and the abrupt nature of her death.

I thought it was quite even handed in explaining both Charles and Diana's misshapen emotional development and the inevitability of their breakup. There is no blanket assessment of blame, but cogent examination of the relationship of the principals.

One reads a chilling account of the breakup of the Spencers and how the Spencer children were wounded but tried to carry on in spite of the devastation, the utter betrayal of Diana's mother by her grandmother in the subsequent custody dispute. Diana's deep need for love was understandable. It raises questions, however, as to why she would want to marry into arguably the least demonstrative family in the country.

On the whole, a quick but enveloping read that clears up many loose ends.

I'm currently enrolled in a course on writing biographies, taught by Anne Edwards at the UCLA Extension Program. On the first day of the course the author brought an assorted copies of some of the 24 books that she's written over the years and we were each asked to choose one to read during the ten-week course. I read a lot of biographies but I had never yet read one of Anne's. Though I am a bit of a self-confessed Anglophile, "Ever After, Diana and the Life she Led" wouldn't have naturally been my first choice. Most of the others were already taken however, and Anne suggested that I might enjoy reading this one.

The tragic death of Princess Diana is one of those moments in one's life where were one knows exactly the instant that one heard the heartbreaking news.

I'm quite pleased indeed that this was the one she suggested. I found Edwards writing style very engaging and though cliché or not, I found the book very difficult to put down. I enjoyed it immensely. Edwards has a way of recreating the feeling of the moment exactly as when it occurred. She has a talent of bringing in all of the senses so that you really feel that you are there, standing in the moment. "Park House, Diana's home, was a ten-bedroom Victorian country house with staff cottages, stables and a tennis court. Although it was four miles inland, easterly winds brought the scent of salt to remind the occupants of the area's seafaring history."

I found it thoroughly enjoyable, so much so, that I've decided to order a number of Edwards other books from here on Amazon.

This book was a good read. No trashy suposition by authors who never met her, or have no psychology degree stating she had a personality disorder.

This book has more substance and less book selling gossip than other recent books.

This is a far more balanced approach to Princess Diana's life than Bedell's 's Diana: In Search of Herself. The facts about the role of Mrs. Parker Bowles and Prince Charles are far more accurate--the deep attachment between the two is made evident both before and after the Prince Charles-Lady Diana engagement and wedding. Apparently, Prince Charles and Mrs. Parker Bowles could not totally separate from one another since they met in the early 1970s and remain a couple to this day. There is no stating in this book that Princess Diana's jealousy drove Prince Charles back to Camilla. Also covered (but not in Bedell's book) is the massive outpouring of grief after Princess Diana's death. This emphasizes that Princess Diana was an admired woman but also had the problems with which people could identify (e.g. being in a loveless marriage and having an eating disorder).