Finding freedom when the book is finished

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I can honestly say by the time I got to the end of the audiobook Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family, I felt like I was finding freedom. By 1.5 hours into the audiobook, it was apparent the book is a PR puff piece, bordering on obsequious, as though one were writing an autobiography and making oneself appear perfect in every possible way, ie “While in Africa he did a little secret diamond scouting with a close friend who helped him to source the perfect conflict free stone.”

Two hours in, the book feels like a PR puff piece that is a complete rehash of every news story of all aspects of their relationship and life, already amply covered and published in every media platform, without any new information or insights. It’s actually kind of boring, but perhaps amping the playback speed to 1.75x would help (nah, sounds too much like narration by a member of the lollipop guild). Annoying words appearing throughout the book: giggling, perfect, cheeky, adoringly, lovely. This book is a monument to first world problems.

Despite the activism they are committed to, it comes across as extremely trite, a treatise on “how to fall in love when one has massive financial resources to make almost all your dreams come true.” The book more likely to be interesting and valuable would be the sequel to this one about maintaining a love relationship when previously available massive financial underpinnings are gone, you have a child, quit the royal family and become estranged from the husband’s family 20 months after the marriage, the financial power within the relationship is in flux, you are struggling to maintain a certain standard of living, etc.

Their publishing opportunity would have been far better served by completely ignoring all the bad things mean people did to them, and by focusing and communicating how they want their future to look, how they plan to create their new life, describing their guiding principles—the people and life experiences instilling those life lessons into them, including people’s stories that moved them during their work with groups supported by their charities, etc. Such a book would illustrate the majesty of their souls within, and within those they’ve encountered as they condescend to those of low estate, witnessing the power, strength, resilience, dignity, and inspiration of the human struggle.

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