Do Let’s Have Another Drink: The Singular Wit and Double Measures of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother

Product Information

This is not a chronological retelling of Elizabeth’s life, but rather many different windows into different times in her life. If you are in your seventies, however, you will remember the furore over Margaret’s doomed relationship with Group Captain Peter Townsend. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Now, Do Let’s Have Another Drink recounts 101 biographical vignettes – one for each year of her long, remarkable life, including her coming-of-age during World War I, the abdication of her brother-in-law, the truth about her tragic nieces and her relationship with her two daughters over half a century of widowhood.

I would have been interested to read more anecdotes about the Queen Mother's tours outside Great Britain as there are interesting chapters about her time in Canada, the USA, South Africa, France and Northern Ireland. For fans of The Crown and Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret , a deliciously entertaining collection of 101 fascinating and funny anecdotes about Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother—one for each year of her life. The Duke of Windsor was a terrible spoiled man, who, when he got what he wanted, still winged and wined. I think if you knew who and when the author was talking about you would be fine, for example the Abdication Crisis, Princess Margaret’s affair with Group Captain Townsend, her husbands early death, if you didn’t, then you would be floundering a bit. On the whole, it is a delightful read for history enthusiasts, royal admirers, and anyone curious about the life of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother—an extraordinary woman who captured the hearts of many.

With 101 anecdotes that span the 101 years of the Queen Mother's life, it was like walking through history through the narrow (euro-centric, aristocratic) window of one person's life. If you’re looking for a book about the Queen Mother that’s not a run-of-the-mill biography, give this one a try.

There are plenty of funny stories about encounters with the Queen mum, most revolving around her love of a "little drinky-poo" (or twelve) before, during, and after lunch.It doesn’t sound like an enjoyable life to me, but Elizabeth the Queen Mother appeared to have a grand life. However, once I switched gears and realized what a wonderful biography I was reading about this historic royal icon, I ploughed through it with delight!

With nothing of the entertaining malice of, for instance, Craig Brown’s NINETY-NINE GLIMPSES OF PRINCESS MARGARET, it contains very little worth reading until 2/3 of the way through the book, and even then, it relies on repetitions of all the old stories. This is not a traditional biographical book, so if you do not know a great deal about Elizabeth Bowes Lyon, Queen Consort of the United Kingdom and the Queen Mother, I would recommend starting with a different book. A biography written in a new format which makes it interesting and chatty, sees the lady from a more human and emotional view. As Queen of England and later the Queen Mother, we see her tenacity and humorous side emerge as Elizabeth could be herself.

Princess Fuzzypants here: The lady who advised never to turn down an opportunity to sit or to use the lady’s room was clearly someone highly sensible with a wicked sense of humour. I will say though I do feel it was a bit skimpy in the later years of the Queen Mother’s life, particularity concerning the relationships she had with her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She was a lover of life, and even though she had feuds with members of her family, such as Wallis Simpson and Princess Diana, she truly loved and fought for her family until the very end of her long life. I thought from the somewhat comical cover, that the book might be less substantial and focus more on the quips and (perhaps) public gaffs that the Queen Mother was known for.