Wallis: The Uncommon Life of the Duchess of Windsor

Summary

The first unbiased account of the fascinating and outrageous life of Wallis Simpson, the commoner who bewitched the King of England…

It was the love story of the century. In December 1936, King Edward VIII abdicated the throne to marry ‘ the woman I love’ , Wallis Warfield Simpson. American, twice-divorced and of distinctly uncompromising personality, Wallis was a far cry from the sort of woman the Royal Family would have chosen for their future Queen. Their ostracism of her, coupled with a thinly veiled animosity in the British press tainted her reputation for the rest of her life.

From her birth in Pennsylvania in 1896 to her death in Paris in 1986, the Duchess moved from obscurity through a world of privilege, palaces, titles, high society and romance, to the accompaniment of hatreds, feuds, conspiracies and lies.

In his acclaimed biography Greg King sifts through the decades of rumour and accusation to reveal the woman behind the legend. Wild speculation about her past affairs, her domination of the Duke and her tragic, lonely end are answered. Using previously untapped sources, conducting hundreds of interviews with survivors and expertly marshalling a huge array of documentation, King presents a definitive and sympathetic portrait of the woman who was punished for falling in love.