Not as good as The Queen and I.

Enjoyable enough. Narration a tad irritating with "he said she said" badly phrased /pauses.

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Entertaining, but a bit savage

There are many funny scenes and moments in this book read with great gusto by Patricia Gallimore. Listeners to the Archers (she's Pat Archer) will be surprised to hear her having to swear like a trooper throughout the reading! The story is rather like a light-hearted combination of Orwell's 1984 crossed with a touch of Animal Farm. I enjoyed the story but have misgivings about the cruelty of some of the satire directed at the Royal family. I'm no Royalist, far from it, but while the lampooned politicians in the book are fictitious, the Royals are real people who can't answer back. I particularly disliked the depiction of Prince Phillip as an incontinent and demented inmate of a care home.

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10 people found this helpful

Reader put me off

Great book - couldn’t finish as the reader was so annoying it made me cringe. Truly annoying

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2 people found this helpful

Great story but….

I’ve read this book more than once in the past and enjoy the story. That’s all I have to say about the actual text of the book.

I have a bigger issue though. The narration in this version is just….something. The narrator manages the accents of the majority of characters very well, but there are a couple that are really inappropriate. To hear a white woman attempting to speak like an Asian man or as a West Indian guy is all kinds of wrong. It came across as though they were trying to perpetuate racial stereotypes or actually just being unconsciously racist.

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Worth it just for the narration.

The narration is fantastic. Just stick with the plot as it drags on but has much of Sue’s observations and humour to accompany what I class as her hardest book to read. I never liked the book but surprisingly it is rescued by the narration. This is what Audible is about, turns the book into a 4 star instead of a one star.

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1 person found this helpful

Absolutely outstanding

I love the work of Sue Townsend, and this is one of her best . Beautifully crafted and wonderfully told.


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Queen Camilla

Not as good as The Queen and I, but still worth a listen for a light heated tale.

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Very Enjoyable

I have read this book once before, but it was lovely to revisit it. It contains some of the same characters that were introduced to us in the Queen and I as well as some new and interesting characters. I’m not sure if it would be as enjoyable for younger people but for people who were adults at the time this book was written I think it would bring a lot of smiles and I realisation that so much has changed since that time.

I enjoyed it so much that I even woke up and listened to it a couple of times during the night. I love the way the dogs were portrayed and the role they played in the plot. I think the narrator was excellent and her delivery added to the book. For me the only weak aspect of the book was the ending which was too quick and it left a lot of loose ends. I would have liked more detail and a more elaborate ending. Having said that the book brought many smiles, a few reasonably accurate predictions of what would happen in the future, a cynical but accurate portrayal of politicians and it made me think.

I would recommend this book, but readers should have previously read the Queen and I which is my favourite Sue Townsend book and it introduces Characters in this book.

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Enjoyable

Okay, so it's Sue Townsend, not Proust or Balzac, but this is a funny and heart-warming imaginary tale.

The story becomes believable in these times of eroded civil liberties. Maybe a 21st Century Prime Minister could manipulate Parliament to create concentration camps for undesirables and exile the Royal Family. Ms Townsend certainly does make it believable.

The narration does give you the mental image of Prince Charles fretting over the chickens he keeps in the back yard of his council-house garden, so proud of the washing up bowl he bought in the Pound Shop earlier that day. The rest of the Royal Family are similarly brought to life in the setting of a fenced in estate comprising of wife-beaters, benefit-cheats and chavs.

There is a real working-class grit that shows both the love and the ghastliness of council-estate Britain that is accentuated by the contrast between the underclass and the Royals that are forced to share their existence.

The story is engaging, sad, cheery, depressing and totally believeable in the same way as Orwell's 1984.

I could barely stop listening.

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15 people found this helpful

Very Funny

I found this story very funny, and beautifully read. It is Sue Townsend at her best.

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