Mrs Queen Takes the Train by William Kuhn

“[A] charmer of a first novel. . . . This Elizabeth is delightful, slyly funny company. You’ll never look at the real one the same way again.” — People (3 ½ stars)

“A witty, contemporary story of the Downton Abbey-esque tensions between servants and employers, the young and the old, and tradition and modernity.” — Glamour

A lively, wonderfully inventive, delightful romp reminiscent of Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader, Mrs Queen Takes the Train takes readers into the mind of the grand matriarch of Britain’s Royal Family, bringing us an endearing runaway Queen Elizabeth on the town, and leading us behind the Buckingham Palace walls into the upstairs/downstairs spaces of England’s monarchy.

After decades of service and years of watching her family’s troubles splashed across the tabloids, Britain’s Queen is beginning to feel her age. She needs some proper cheering up and an unexpected opportunity offers her relief: an impromptu visit to a place that holds happy memories—the former royal yacht, Britannia, now moored near Edinburgh. Hidden beneath a skull-emblazoned hoodie, the limber Elizabeth (thank goodness for yoga) walks out of Buckingham Palace into the freedom of a rainy London day and heads for King’s Cross to catch a train to Scotland, leaving behind a desperate team of courtiers who must find the missing Windsor before a national scandal erupts.