Includes bibliographical references (pages [509]-541) and index.

Never again: the royals confront a post-Diana world -- Sex and sensibility: why Charles loves Camilla -- The wilderness years: how Camilla hung in -- Mother of the nation: the Queen's twenty-first-century headaches -- A question of independence: how Elizabeth and Philip made it work -- Swan songs: Margaret and the Queen Mother leave the party -- Jubilee girl: the Queen's encore -- Servant problems: what the butler saw -- Camilla's line in the sand: a new duchess in the winners' enclosure -- The princes next door: William's and Harry's competing realities -- The lost boys: how the princes survived their childhood -- Enter Kate: William meets an extraordinary, ordinary girl -- Queen in waiting: Kate closes the deal -- The great escape: Harry the hero finds his way -- Snoopers: how the press stalked the royals -- Gloriana: the Windsors' winning streak -- The Duke of Hazard: Andrew's money pit -- An inconvenient friend: the lure of Jeffrey Epstein -- Number six on the call sheet: Meghan Markle's world -- Flashman's flameout: Harry confronts his demons -- Smitten: the stars align for Harry and Meghan -- Magic kingdom: a wedding transforms the House of Windsor -- Unravelling: the monarchy's morning after -- Privacy and prejudice: surviving the Windsor Fishbowl -- Scorched earth: 'Annus Horribilis' redux -- Epilogue: embers.

"Never again" became Queen Elizabeth II's mantra shortly after Princess Diana's tragic death. More specifically, there could never be "another Diana" - a member of the family whose global popularity upstaged, outshone, and posed an existential threat to the British monarchy. Brown takes readers on a tour de force journey through the scandals, love affairs, power plays, and betrayals that have buffeted the monarchy over the last twenty-five years. We see the Queen's stoic resolve after the passing of Princess Margaret, the Queen Mother, and Prince Philip, her partner for seven decades, and how she triumphs in her Jubilee years even as family troubles rage around her. Brown explores Prince Charles's determination to make Camilla Parker Bowles his wife, the tension between William and Harry on "different paths," the ascendance of Kate Middleton, the downfall of Prince Andrew, and Harry and Meghan's stunning decision to step back as senior royals. Despite the fragile monarchy's best efforts, "never again" seems fast approaching. Picking up where Tina Brown's masterful The Diana Chronicles left off, The Palace Papers reveals how the royal family reinvented itself after the trau?matic years when Diana's blazing celebrity ripped through the House of Windsor like a comet"--Publisher's description.