This book was a lot to digest. It was, without a doubt, a labor of love on the part of its author. Frances Dimond has unearthed every possible detail, leaving no stone unturned and no fact omitted. The author herself pronounces the book "overwhelmingly chronological" in one of the author's note sections. And this is where the main drawback of the book lies.

Every moment of Alexandra's life is documented. Every. Moment. In fact, it makes for tedious reading. At times I struggled to get through it. Another drawback is the lack of photographs. There are only a few. This comes as a surprise as the author had previously published a book about photographs taken by Queen Alexandra.

But still there are gold nuggets of information to be unearthed in this mammoth tome. There were things I had been previously unaware of that I was glad to learn of.

Recommended for the most hardcore of Queen Alexandra fans. While this book may be the most complete picture we have of the late Queen, it is not the most readable. ( )