Princess Diana was the most famous woman in the world, celebrated across the globe for her poise and glamour. But before stepping out of the royal carriage at St. Paul’s Cathedral she spent nineteen years as the shy, awkward Lady Diana Spencer. How did the aristocratic ugly duckling become a beautiful royal swan? Bestselling author Wendy Holden explores the astonishing backstory and young adulthood of the ultimate royal celebrity.
Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from Wendy Holden’s The Princess, which is out August 1st 2023.
Britain, 1961: A bouncing blond baby is born to Viscount Althorp, heir to the Spencer earldom, and his wife Frances. Diana grows up amid the fallout of her parents’ messy divorce. She struggles at school. Moving to London, she takes menial jobs as a cleaner and nanny. Her refuge throughout is romantic novels. She dreams of falling in love and being rescued by a handsome prince.
In royal circles, there is concern about the Prince of Wales. Nearly 30, Charles remains unmarried; the right girl needs to be found, and fast. She must be young, aristocratic and come to the royal family without any past liaisons.
The eighteen-year-old Diana Spencer is just about the only candidate. Her desperation to be loved dovetails perfectly with royal desperation for a bride. But as the ruthless Palace machine starts up, there are challenges for Diana to face plus mysteries she can’t fathom, from the strangeness of life within the palace walls to a certain Mrs. Parker Bowles. Can her romantic dream survive the forces that shape her into a global icon?
Term progressed. I worked hard, as I was supposed to, and did well, as I was supposed to. Diana, meanwhile, seemed to plow a rather less steady course. She developed a reputation for daring, for never turning down a challenge. On one occasion I watched as, egged on by the others, she ate eight slices of bread and butter and two kippers at a sitting, a new record for gluttony.
As stories circulated of her climbing high trees and running down the drive at midnight, I grew concerned for her. Encouraged by the ever‑admiring crowd, she seemed to be taking more and more risks. I watched, worried, from the back of a gaggle of girls on the edge of the school’s outdoor swimming pool as Diana, arms outstretched, soared high into the air from the topmost board. My heart was in my mouth, and for some time after that, whenever I closed my eyes, I saw her long body in its black school swimming costume against the boundless blue of the sky, plunging down like a bullet and slicing into the water like a knife.
Then rumors began about her dancing in the dining hall at night, against school rules. When, finally, they filtered down to our end of the dormitory, I looked at Catherine in dismay. “She’ll get into trouble,” I said.
Catherine gave me a wise look. “Well, she wouldn’t be the first Spencer to do that. Her sister got expelled, you know.”
Sheer horror flashed through me. I didn’t enjoy school much, but being expelled from it was the worst thing I could imagine. As well as the shame and disgrace, it would mean the derailment of all my future hopes. I had never heard of it actually happening though; Miss Rudge, the headmistress, did not seem like the expelling type. “What for?” I asked.
Catherine was clearly enjoying my obvious amazement. “Drinking.”
“Drinking what?” It didn’t seem like a crime to me. “Alcohol, of course. Vodka.”
I felt naive and unsophisticated. I hardly knew what vodka was, let alone why a schoolgirl would drink it.
“Lights out!” yelled the dormitory monitor, a bossy girl called Rose at the other end.
Darkness flooded the room, and we huddled under our blankets. I could not settle, however. I was agitated, and my mind tumbled with questions. I edged myself toward Catherine. “Why did she drink vodka?”
Catherine was almost asleep and came back to consciousness with a snort. “What?”
I repeated my question in a whisper.
“It doesn’t make your breath smell, so no one’s able to tell,” hissed back Catherine.
But someone had obviously been able to tell in the end. “I don’t mean that,” I whispered. “I mean, why drink it at all?”
“Who knows? Those old aristocratic families do crazy things. For the fun of it, I suppose.”
It sounded like a waste to me, and the idea that Diana, who had helped me, would end up sharing her sister’s fate was an awful one. I decided to keep an eye on her.
From my bed at the end of the dormitory, it was difficult to monitor the rest of the long room, but I would do my best. I dozed, half‑awake, straining my ears for any noise that might be someone creeping out.
Once the initial whispering and giggling had died down, there was nothing for some hours. It seemed that the Diana dancing rumors were unsubstantiated talk after all. I must have dozed off, because something suddenly woke me up.
I sat up in bed. All was silent. The moonlight blooming behind the thin curtains showed a row of prone and slumbering girls. And then, at the far end by the door, a movement. Someone was slipping out.
I lifted my covers and climbed reluctantly from beneath them. It was only October, but the nights were already cold. The chill air seized me as I groped for my dressing gown. I fumbled for my slippers and hurried down the lino floor between the beds. Reaching Diana’s, I saw with dismay that it was empty.
Once outside the dormitory, I felt my heart begin to thump. I realized that my actions potentially also had consequences for me. Roaming about the school at night was strictly forbidden. If I was caught, there would be trouble. Quite how much, I didn’t want to dwell on.
As I sped through the gallery toward the staircase, I glanced at the portraits hanging on the paneled walls. Their stern gaze seemed to warn me to turn back before it was too late. I carried on, however, down the slippery polished stairs. Above me hung the huge and heavy brass chandelier, which, as always, I imagined pulling away and plunging to the ground with a mighty crash.
The passage at the bottom was dark and deserted. I had never been around the school at night; it was entirely different from the daytime, when it was full of the chatter and clatter of girls. It seemed more like the private house it once had been. I started to wonder who had lived here and whether their spirits now walked the corridors.
So terrifying was this thought that I almost scurried back up the stairs. Then I paused. Above the boom of my heart, my ear had caught something, a faint snatch of music. It was coming from the direction of the dining room.
I hurried along the passage, in which, as always, the smell of cabbage lingered. The music got louder as I reached the double doors. I recognized it now, some swelling Tchaikovsky from The Nutcracker.
I opened the door a crack and peered in. Slabs of moonlight fell through the windows onto long tables set for morning breakfast with rows of white plates. An orange sat on each, all glowing eerily like lamps, and dancing between them, white flannel school nightdress billowing, was Diana.
Her eyes were wide open, but I could see that she was somewhere very far away. Propelled by the music, she sped over the parquet in her bare feet. I had no idea where she had got the record player from; some nearby office, perhaps. I felt awed at her daring, but far more at her dancing. I had never known she was as good as this.
It was transporting to watch as she first spun, then lengthened out into a graceful arabesque. Where she had learned this sequence of rippling steps that seemed to grow naturally out of her feet, one leading to the other, I could not imagine. In Madame Vacani’s lessons, we rarely got beyond the basic positions.
Her movements made a romantic dreamworld of the mundane dining room with its cabbage smells. There was a mysterious radiance about her, a quiet strength and an absolute authority, as if she knew exactly what she was doing and why.
Then something pulled me back from the dreamworld and into the here and now. A sound, coming from behind. Footsteps in the passage, firm and adult, approaching rapidly. Someone was coming.
Excerpted from THE PRINCESS by Wendy Holden, published by Berkley, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. Copyright © 2023
