Andrew Lownie is a lucky author. He spent many years researching the story of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, speaking to 300 people with intimate knowledge of the couple – far more refused – and accessing files from the National Archives for which he needed a court order. Last week, King Charles announced his brother would be stripped of his royal titles, including prince, and will move out of his home, Royal Lodge.

Entitled, his unauthorised biography of Andrew and Sarah, appeared shortly before Andrew’s precipitous fall from grace and will undoubtedly be a bestseller. (There is more up-to-date information, and perhaps less speculation, than in Nigel Cawthorne’s 2020 book Prince Andrew: Epstein, Maxwell and the Palace.)

“I think there’s lots more still to come, lots more, and it will be even more damaging material,” Lownie said last week of the ongoing revelations about the former prince, now Andrew Mountbatten Windsor.

Review: Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York – Andrew Lownie (William Collins)

A historian, journalist and literary agent, Lownie has specialised in writing about royal scandals. Entitled seems an obvious next step for an author whose last book was about the Duke of Windsor, whose 1936 abdication to marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson was the biggest crisis for the monarchy in the past century.

Even for those not interested in royal gossip, Entitled is a fascinating read. As Lownie writes, “It is a tale of childhood trauma, infidelity, lust, betrayal, corruption, greed, extravagance, arrogance, entitlement, Establishment cover-up and hubris.”

We have known for most of the past 20 years that ex-Prince Andrew was both reckless and corrupt. We have also known Sarah Ferguson (Fergie), his former wife and apparently continuing housemate, at least until now (she has announced she will be moving into her own separate home), was equally so. There is no suggestion, however, that her contact with Jeffrey Epstein involved seeking sexual favours.

It was the couple’s closeness to convicted sex offender Epstein that brought them down. Lownie writes that “Randy Andy” was not only close to Epstein, but apparently shared young women with........

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