I’ve been a big fan of Charlie Higson for many years, for his excellent comedy, and more recently his superb writing – I really loved his “Enemy” series. I recently saw him at the Idler Festival in London, and while I was there I got a signed copy of this, his first-ever non-fiction book. It’s based on a podcast series of the same name, and it’s a funny, snappy and highly accessible book about all the English monarchs since William the Conqueror.

It’s very much written in the author’s trademark style, with some very funny and sharp observations, but it’s also a good delve into the strengths and weaknesses of each monarch, what they achieved (or didn’t), what they were like as people, and the significant events of their reigns. The only reason I’ve marked this down slightly is simply because it wouldn’t be my first choice of book to read had it been written by anyone else, and I’m a hardcore republican who loathes the royals and what a bunch of useless wasters they are these days, so I found a few chapters somewhat tedious, but most of them were great, especially the ones from Queen Victoria onwards as I found them very useful summaries of how we got to where we are today. Edward VIII was particularly interesting, and I think we really dodged a bullet there – if he hadn’t abdicated, we’d have ended up with a Nazi-admiring racist on the throne during the Second World War. That said, I think there’s been plenty of other Nazi-admiring racists in the royal family over the years…he was just one of the less subtle ones.

Anyway, it’s a good read, and because each monarch has their own chapter, you can delve in and out of it wherever you like. It’ll be interesting to see if Higson writes any more non-fiction, and on the strength of this I’ll be happy to read it if he does. An added bonus is the illustrations, done by Jim Moir (aka Vic Reeves) in his unique, surreal style, and a great addition to the text.