Why do we love the Royals?

It's Independence Day and the news broadcasts are featuring Kate and Will's tour of Canada. Feature segments are discussing her inate fashion sense (she picks all her own clothes and she did her own make-up for the wedding), how easily she converses with people as if she was born to the role. We are lapping it up in prime time and yet...
we abandoned all this to be a republic.

So why do are we still so fascinated with the royals? They are celebrities to be sure. But if Lady Gaga did a tour of Canada she wouldn't draw those crowds and she certainly wouldn't make news headlines.

Why do ordinary people wait for hours in the rain for a chance to see them pass by in a flash in a big car?

There must be something in our genes that needs ceremony and pagentry. Rousing marches, troops in uniform, flags, somehow stir our humdrum breasts.
And the king/god figure has been around since the dawn of mythology. Clearly those early nomads needed a strong personality to guide them past the wooly mammoths and sabre toothed tigers but when did that figure take on god-like qualities? And have to be accompanied by ceremony?  Since the earliest of recorded time if we read the stories on the tombs of the Pharoes.
The worship of royalty also seems to be in our genes. All those little girls playing princesses in a time when none of them can aspire to the role some day (unless their name was Kate?). Or maybe it's just a wish to live a fairy tale life, in a palace, waited on hand and foot, ones every whim obeyed.

Having done a few book tours in my life I can tell you that I would not envy their lives one bit. When I am on the road for two weeks, meeting new people every day, having to give speeches, greet fans, do media interviews it is very, very tiring. I fall into bed exhausted at the end of each day. And that's for a few days.
The royals, especially the queen, do that every day of their lives. Endlessly shaking hands, endlessly smiling, being gracious, never looking bored, never looking as if they wished they were somewhere else. This is a demanding job, folks. And a dangerous one. You never know when a crackpot might decide to assasinate a royal person. (Look what started World War 1)

But I'll share a story about the power of royalty. The queen was coming to my college to open a new building. Another student and I were chosen to welcome her and present her with a bouquet. My fellow student was an ardent socialist. For weeks before the event she griped that this was a waste of money and why should one person be treated as if they were superior to another person. The day arrived. The big black car drew up and out stepped the queen, petite, elegant and with the most radiant smile you have ever seen. My socialist friend breathed only two words.... "She's real!"

They are magic for us and this new generation shows all indications of living up to our expectations. 

Royal Gossip Tuesday--another Duke of Cambridge

Last Monday I planned to talk about another Duke of Cambridge, but I got side tracked into another William and Kate story. I'll try not to get side tracked again about the latest sighting at Wimbledon, but I have to say 1. Her dress was fabulous and so appropriate and it sold out online in half an hour (she should start her own clothing line and could finance the whole royal family), and 2. didn't they look happy together? Turning to each other to share comments that made them both smile. So different from the early days of Charles and Diana--she the blushing and tonguetied bride, he indifferent and supercilious.

Anyway,  the title of the Duke of Cambridge has not existed since the last duke died in the early 1900s. He was a Prince of Teck. Cousin to Queen Victoria. Now it gets complicated. The son of this duke, Prince Adolphus of Teck, younger brother to Queen Mary of England and later styled Marquess of Cambridge, had an affair with Rosa Baring Arkwright and this affair produced a daughter Vera.  Vera's mother Rosa, of the influential banking family Barings, wanted out of a loveless marriage and secured her divorce after the birth of this child. But Prince Adolphus was already married and thus Rosa was married off to a royal relative for respectability.  So Vera grew up as the recognized child of a royal. She lived a glittering, if bohemian lifestyle, friend to the Duke of Westminster, Winston Churchill and other luminaries of the time. But her real claim to fame came when she volunteered as a nurse in WW1 and becamse friendly with fellow nurse Coco Chanel.

Coco and Vera formed a close friendship and Coco was shrewd enough to realize that Vera opened the doors to English society to her. Vera became Chanel's business manager. Together they conceived the idea of the blending of masculine and feminine in haute couture. They borrowed tweed jackets from the Duke of Westminster and even used Queen Mary's jewels to accessorize the outfits.

So why I am so fascinated with all this? Because my heroine, Lady Georgiana, goes to the Riviera in her next book. In my research I looked up who might have been on the Riviera that summer and learned about Coco Chanel and Vera Bate Lombardi and their fashion show and the queen's jewels. Too good to ignore for a mystery writer. And so this book will include fact more outlandish than fiction. That's the fun of research.  Oh, and the book is called Naughty in Nice. It's out September 6th.

Historic week ahead

This is one of those weeks we'll probably all remember where we were and what we were doing, in the same way that we remember Kennedy's Assassination if we're old enough, and certainly Princess Diana's wedding.

And I am not refering to Rhys Bowen's visit to Ann Arbor, Bethesda, Annapolis and Pittsburgh either, although I like to think they are momentous occasions. I am, of course, refering to the royal wedding.

 A lot of us will get up at an ungodly hour to watch Will and Kate's wedding live. On the West Coast it will mean rising at 1 a.m., or not going to bed the night before. Not sure how many devoted fans will do that. On the East Coast, where I will be that day, it will mean rising at 4 a.m.  Still ungodly. I may make it by six, and I'm sure the news channels will re-broadcast over and over.

Now that I learned that Tony Blair didn't receive an invitation, I don't feel so badly about not getting one. In fact when I watch such momentous occasions as this, my one thought is always.... what happens if anyone wants to go to the bathroom?  They always make you take your seats hours before the event, especially in these days of maximum security, and I'm sure it will be cold and drafty in the Abbey. It always is in English churches. So in a way I'm glad I'm not there, or one of those lining the royal route, because if I knew I had three or four hours of not being able to find a loo, I'd immediately want to go.

Sorry. I'm a practical kind of gal in some ways. But what about you? Do you wish you could be there?
And I look forward to seeing some of you at Aunt Agatha's in Ann Arbor on Wed, Malice Domestic on Friday and Saturday, Barnes and Noble Annapolis on Sunday and the Festival of Mystery in Oakmont on Monday.

Advice for a Royal Couple on Valentine's Day

Those of you who take the Sunday newspapers in the US will have seen the feature on Prince William and Kate in which famous people were asked to give them advice for a good marriage ahead. I suppose famous people are the only ones who can give advice to a couple like Will and Kate. Because marriage in the fish bowl of fame is very different from a normal relationship. We can only imagine the added stress of having ones every move reported in the press, of seeing the cover of those rags in the supermarket proclaiming that one of them is having an affair, is gay, is battling a terminal disease.. or any of the other completely false statements they print to sell papers.

If William even smiles at another woman, there will be rumors. If Kate refuses her dessert one day, she'll be battling anorexia. It's not easy being in the public eye. So my piece of advice would be--trust each other and laugh together and you can get through anything. The dedication for my next book, Bless the Bride, that comes out on March 1st, is to my husband John. I thank him for his help in each of my books, because he is a great editor and first reader, but I thought that he needed a dedication all to himself for once. And it reads, "You are the wind beneath my wings."

So this is the additional advice to William and Kate that I would give: be the wind beneath the wings for each other. Allow them the glamor of the spotlight, the public adoration, without feeling jealous or put out. Decide that you are taking on the world as a team, not as two individuals.

What advice would you give?