Yours, E.R.

I have reached a stage in my life when I would like people to see who I really am, what I think and, just now and then, how I feel . . .

For many years, Her Majesty the Queen has received a weekly report on the news and issues of the day from one of her senior private secretaries. She has replied to them in letters which have expressed her private thoughts about what is happening in the world, and her reflections on life at Buckingham Palace. Now she has decided to allow some of these letters to appear in the public domain. They reveal for the first time what she really thinks about the Prime Ministers she has met, about Helen Mirren, about the great, the good, and the mysteriously famous people she meets as she goes about her duties, and about the unique pleasures and pressures of being HRH. Affectionately imagined, Yours, E.R. provides a glimpse into a year that has seen our Queen jump out of a helicopter, win a Bafta, sit in a Cabinet meeting, and become a great grandmother. It also offers a view on the way we live now, as seen from the top by someone who is both at the center of national life, and yet removed from it.