Prince Harry’s bombshell memoir Spare has dominated the conversation for a week.
His confessions about losing his virginity in a field, killing 25 Taliban in Afghanistan, and allegations about his stepmother, Camilla, have raised many eyebrows.
Prince William, is said to be “devastated” by his brother’s claims, while courtiers believe Harry’s father King Charles may never forgive him.
But how has Spare gone down with the rest of us?
We asked six readers from around the country for their take on the book that has driven a new wedge between Harry and the Royal Family.
Catherine D'Mello is a 35-year-old archives imaging specialist from Ealing, West London
I can’t believe any good mate would have read this book beforehand and not told Harry to remove some of the more hair-raising stories.
Harry seems to have included a mix of his own memories and hastily Googled facts.
He comes across as a little boy lost, left out of the family’s decision-making process and main events, and there’s a certain naivety about what was required from him as a royal.
His attempts to vilify the Press and the frankly embarrassing anagram of one of his journalist enemies paint him as quite child-like.
It’s no surprise he feels wronged by the way his life has been spun by the media and his own family, but every chapter comes across as very “woe is me”. But there were parts that made me warm to him. Being brought up in a family that didn’t show emotion must be tough.
Hearing him talk about the death of his mum, Princess Diana, is anguishing. He says for years he and William thought she had gone into hiding, and would come back to claim them.
That must have been very traumatic, especially being left with a family that couldn’t show him warmth.
Instead he describes shooting weekends where having a novice hunter shove their face in the carcass of their first kill is the bonding experience, rather than activities that would meet his emotional needs.
Such weird traditions go some way to explain the way he is as an adult.
Genelle Aldred, 40, is an author and consultant from North London
Listening to Spare at times made me feel quite sad for Prince Harry.
Loneliness seemed like the undercurrent of the first two parts, with longing for a wife, children and his mum. If you’ve experienced deep grief, you know you live with it rather than get over it.
It doesn’t matter what you have; sometimes, the things we want shape us.
Then the love of his life arrived, and I swooned over his romantic gestures!
But that comes crashing down around him as Meghan is not accepted. He calls himself a flawed man, and that does come through; Harry is highly privileged, and he knows it. However, the context of his book is quite different from the snatches of headlines we see. Yes, he does give it to his family both barrels, and by the end of the book, you hear the why: his deep frustration. While I may have dealt with it differently, I respect that he loves his wife and children a lot and wasn’t going to let them be victims of racism or the Press.
He puts his name and face to everything he says, which lends some accountability.
Some people wear the “I’m not reading the book or watching the documentary” as a badge of honour. But, if you have a strong opinion of someone else’s life, at least listen to them having their say.
Harry has grown in my estimation, and it’s a big miss for the Royal Family that he and Meghan are gone.
Carole Robinson, 65, is a retired primary head of Newbiggin-by-the-Sea, Northumberland
Spare me some of these details, Harry – too much information!
It’s difficult to understand the life of a royal. Things we take for granted as normal are not normal in his world, one that seems more fiction than fact.
He would have garnered a more sympathetic response from me had his “jolly japes” not screamed of privilege. It dripped from every page with scant self-awareness.
Confusingly, he rails against life as a royal whilst enjoying all its benefits in full, including no consequences for his admission to class-A drug taking.
He presents as a serial disrupter in a constant quest for attention, throwing family, acquaintances and successive security details under a fleet of buses.
I would have thought more of him had he not used the book as a passive-aggressive vehicle to settle petty family squabbles.
Desiring privacy sits uneasily alongside his invasion of the privacy of family members and friends. I feel he has a lot of growing up to do.
Hopefully he will be able to find the space to live a happy and useful life.
Now is the time to radically slim down the Royal Family.
Mum of two Chris Jackson, 60, of Leicester, works in a bank and is a lifelong royalist
Reading Prince Harry’s memoir left me with a sense of sadness I have never felt before from a book.
I’d started to feel angry watching his interviews this week. It felt like he would say anything to cause his family pain, and that he was bitter.
Reading further, he just seems deeply traumatised and sad.
As a mother to two grown-up children, it is incredibly painful to learn just how deep his rift with his brother William and his sister-in-law Kate has become.
And that’s before you start to understand just how let down he feels by his father King Charles and stepmother Camilla, and how distant from them.
But while I feel deeply sad for him, I cannot help but think he is showing himself up by airing his grievances with his family so publicly.
He just sounds bitter.
And how could Charles ever forget the claims Harry has made about his wife, Camilla?
He might not have been Dad of the Year at times, but when it really mattered, Charles – in my opinion – was there for Harry.
And William, as the future king, must be reeling from Harry’s confessions.
He has been painted as ill-tempered and uncaring, an image many are finding hard to understand.
Overall, the book has left me feeling little but despair for Harry.
Now he doesn’t need to write or say any more. He needs help.
George Dunn, 63, is a retired council street scene manager from Hebburn, Tyne and Wear
Spare is well written and quite detailed with descriptive prose – but having said this, it lacks substance. Many issues are implied but there is little evidence to back them up.
His problems start following his mother’s untimely and tragic death. This certainly affects him mentally and is quite a constant narrative throughout the book.
I can’t imagine how hard it must have been for a young boy to experience such a tragedy and then have to process it. He blamed the Press for hounding his mother and believes if it was not for them, she would still be alive.
His mother’s death impacted on his education, which did not really sink in. He tended to go on a journey of self-destruction, smoking cigarettes and weed and drinking alcohol.
These actions are a cry for help but none was forthcoming.
However, the family did the best they could at the time. I don’t believe anyone realised how badly damaged he was.
For the military, he put in the graft and was a real asset. He certainly did his duty for Queen and country.
He has a hatred for the Press and this goes back to his childhood.
The problem is, he is only critical and loathing of the negative stuff.
Meeting and marrying Meghan has probably saved him as he always wanted to be married with children.
Overall, the book is not as explosive as I had expected and certainly poses no threat to the monarchy.
Mum-of-two Rachel Selim, 34, is a marketer from Sedgley, West Midlands
I’ve always been fascinated by the royals, so I was thrilled when I heard that Harry had written a tell-all book and couldn’t wait to get my hands on it.
I’ve always indulged in the gossip as a bit of a guilty pleasure.
Truthfully, I was a little disappointed at the long passages dedicated to Harry’s time in Botswana, even though he writes so passionately about it.
The descriptions of his military training and learning to fly a helicopter also had me skimming pages, desperate to get to the juicy stuff.
I’d always believed in Harry as the riotous one, the one you’d want to go out for a drink with, and William as the more steady, reliable older brother, trying to keep everyone happy.
But I was surprised and saddened to learn that the two brothers hadn’t ever been that close, that there had always been such competition between them.
What a shame.
By the time Meghan Markle entered the picture, instead of feeling titillated by all the details of their romance, I felt even more saddened at everything the couple had to endure.
I don’t think I’ll take such pleasure in royal gossip from now on.
