Bookclub for Spare

[BornBlonde]

I know there are loads of threads, but thought it may be useful to set up a bookclub thread ahead of the release date fir those interested. I've ordered the audiobook as struggling to find time to read at the moment but love I can listen to an Audiobook while cooking etc

Having seen the formality of the way Charles was brought up (shaking hands with his mother for example) I'm not surprised it affected his parenting. But I did notice how readily Louis trotted along to him at the Jubilee concert and sat on his lap. I hoped that was a sign that he was perhaps more affectionate with his grandchildren.

That's fab @Coxspurplepippin

There are different ways of doing it and I hope I get it right with my DC!

It does but it’s behind a firewall.

The review is why Harry is deluded if he thinks that there is a reconciliation. Camilla dangerous, Kate stuck up as opposed to happy Meghan), William ageing badly and Charles addicted to headlines at the detriment to his children. That’s how he’s portrayed his family to that reviewer.

I'm swithering whether to buy the book or not. I've often found that people who have tried to imitate my Scottish accent are prize dicks. I also can't get over the bullying of the house mother.
Harry seems to be a bully and a liar tbh.

My DH is transferring the book to my eBook so I'll be back!

I didn’t mean to be insensitive with my comment about hugs, but it’s obvious PH wanted them; the most was a handshake or a squeeze of the shoulder. I haven’t seen little Louis on Charles’s lap (I’m not a royal watcher, this is the most time and words I’ve spent on them), but let’s hope it means another generation doesn’t get fucked up.

Have a Google of Charles hugging Harry - plenty of pics available.

The review is why Harry is deluded if he thinks that there is a reconciliation. Camilla dangerous, Kate stuck up as opposed to happy Meghan), William ageing badly and Charles addicted to headlines at the detriment to his children. That’s how he’s portrayed his family to that reviewer

The review was more even-handed and nuanced than that, whilst acknowledging the faults. What I found thought-provoking was the higher-level discussion of the monarchy.

I’m not going to copy & paste the whole article, but I’ll try and find a pertinent quote.

Are there plenty of pics?

I have finished the audible version. I am an avid reader of biographies and autobiographies so I am used to the genre. I also have a PhD in applied linguistics so I know a bit about language. I’m not showing off, I just mean I am pretty aware of language. I honestly think that it’s not at all badly written. It’s very readable, some parts well written and full of details that surprised me (and believe me that I know a lot about the RF for a non royalist). I know it was written by a ghost writer but the words seem to be very close to the way he is. He seems totally authentic and comfortable reading it aloud. He is a very good performer and conveys all sorts of emotions well with his voice, especially humour.

Overall I found it to be one of the most enjoyable books I have read/listened to in a very long time. He comes across as thoughtful, smart, funny and likeable. I am not on any ‘side’ at all and I am certain that other members of his family would have very different stories to tell about the same events. I imagine he must be prickly , defensive and petulant to deal with. But that’s the way life is. Everyone experiences things differently. He clearly has and continues to have struggles with his mental health, but that is both understandable and nothing to use as a reason to dismiss what he says.

I really wish everyone who had an opinion about the book would actually read it. It’s a much better, more thoughtful and more interesting book than you would imagine from the hysteria around it.

There are - have a look.

Here:

After some criticism of Harry and the contents of the book ……..

*Yet this book still holds extraordinary power, not least as the best case yet against a hereditary monarchy. “My problem has never been with the monarchy, nor the concept of monarchy,” Harry writes. “It’s been with the press and the sick relationship that’s evolved between it and the palace.” But how else could such a relationship function, when a royal family exists only to exist? Literally no one would care about Harry’s opinions about elephants, or military veterans, or racism—or anything at all—if not for the accident of his birth.

At the same time, his readers will understand the inhumanity of thrusting anyone into this gilded hell without their permission. The public might love the tiaras and the traditions, but Harry’s memoir makes it impossible to ignore the broken people inside the institution*

'Harry’s memoir makes it impossible to ignore the broken people inside the institution'

Bit rude.

The word disfunction has been bandied around a lot following the publication of Harry's book, but honestly, I don't think there is any more disfunction here than in any other family/institution.

@JustWhattheDoctorOrdered

Thank you. I look forward to reading it

I'm only at the start of the book, but I just read the part where Charles didn't hug Harry when telling him his mum had died....then preceeded to tell him 'It will all be okay' and left him alone in the room....his 12yo son...ALONE after telling him that.

Oh and then dragged him to church!

Truly unbelievable and unforgivable, shocking parenting :(

You can see why the reviewer would think that if he’s swallowed whole the caricatures Harry’s painted of his family.

Indeed. As I said upthread there is plenty of photographic evidence of Charles hugging his sons. Harry's memory, by his own admission, is a bit hazy. So perhaps Charles did hug Harry after telling him his mother had died. Perhaps not. We don't know, and Harry has proved himself an unreliable witness to his own life.

[https://www.google.com/search?q=photo+of+charles+hugging+harry&client=ms-android-xiaomi-rvo3&prmd=inv&sxsrf=AJOqlzUSOgFfQGsHobYzsiQm1o0hx9-M2g:1673643771387&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjH_-TzuMX8AhVLiFwKHSuvBYEQ_AUoAXoECAIQAQ&biw=393&bih=737&dpr=2.75 lots of hugging]

Borrocks - that's why I didn't link before because I'm crap at links!

I've got about 47% of the way through, and am bored out me tights..🥱. I haven't even got to Meghan yet. Totally struggling reading it.

I've given up for now and have found Once Upon a Time series on Disney, which am thinking might be a bit more believable than this book...🤣

Same, I haven't had much time to read it this week. He did very well to get through that training, not an easy feat to say the least. It really does seem like the army was the right place for him, and you can feel his relief and sense of freedom at being out of reach of the press. Enjoying the book a lot atm.

Roussette

Re the hugs discussion, doesn't he just say he never hugged/was hugged by the Queen? He describes is father as finding it difficult to be demonstrative in some ways, but not zero hugs ever unless I'm forgetting that?

Harry is a self-confessed unreliable narrator, who has been taking drugs for over 20 years. His memory is not reliable so unfortunately we can't believe anything he tells us. In addition, he clearly has a massive axe to grind in publishing this book so it is hugely biased.

So, no I'm not gobsmacked at anything Harry writes because that would be taking it at face value.

@Pugdogmom I don’t understand how anyone could find the book boring. It’s full of totally new pieces of information about the royal family and even trivial things like being given a biro for Christmas by Princess Margaret I found entertaining. But each to their own!

I also don’t understand the point of saying you find it unbelievable. Everybody in the whole world (including you)has a different take on the same events. In Harry’s case his memories and perceptions are coloured by trauma and a feeling that he has been short changed in life. He isn’t lying. That is how he honestly sees it. The book isn’t a work of history or a documentary and he is very open himself about how subjective it is. I must have read hundreds of autobiographies and I totally accept that they about that person’s experience of the world, they are not supposed to be a collection of facts. To get a full picture you might have to read other people’s accounts but that doesn’t make the writer a liar or their own account of their life not worth reading. There seem to be plenty of examples in the book where Harry has misremembered unimportant details eg. getting an Xbox and other examples where his feelings are obviously coloured with envy or defensiveness. But that’s just more information about who he is. He has a poor memory of his mother because of trauma and he sees himself as a victim. He’s a human being. That’s the way human beings are.