Royal family braces for Harry’s ‘highly destructive’ memoir, driven by ‘seething anger’

The royal family’s lawyers are said to be “on standby,” and hopes of Prince Harry reconciling with his family are disintegrating as the world awaits the Jan. 10 publication of “Spare,” his highly anticipated memoir which experts already predict could be “highly destructive” to the monarchy and to the new reign of King Charles III.

The title alone says a lot about how Harry’s narrative is likely to be driven by “reserves of seething anger,” which he has expressed toward his family in various interviews since he left royal life in 2020, said the Daily Beast’s royal correspondent Tom Sykes.

The title refers to a phrase used in aristocratic English families to describe “the supposed good fortune” of having two sons, Sykes said. The family has “an heir and a spare.” In the case of then-Prince Charles and the late Princess Diana, they had their “heir,” William, while Harry was their “spare.”

In this position, Harry often felt overshadowed by his older brother, who was raised to be a leader and to be seen as “perfect,” according to biographer Robert Lacey. Harry, on the other hand, was left to be seen as a supporting player and occasionally cast as the family screw-up.

Richard Fitzwilliams said, in an interview with the Daily Mail, that the “sensational” title of the memoir implies that Harry felt he “was not valued or … that he did not feel at the center of events.”

We are excited to announce the remarkably personal and emotionally powerful story of Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex.

SPARE, the highly anticipated #PrinceHarryMemoir, will be published on January 10, 2023. Learn more at https://t.co/L0I4CT4flH pic.twitter.com/iqdBjBwkWE

— Random House Group (@randomhouse) October 27, 2022

With this book, Harry is definitely placing himself at the center of events, and the “consequences of this will be far-reaching and may be highly destructive,” Fitzwilliams said. The Daily Mail added that lawyers for the royal family are “on standby” in case anything Harry says in his memoir is seen as legally actionable.

In its press release, Penguin Random House said that the Duke of Sussex’s 416-page autobiography will offer “raw, unflinching honesty.” It will take readers on Harry’s personal journey “from trauma to healing.”

Those words imply that Harry won’t hold back in being “critical of everyone and everything,” the Daily Mail said. There were reports that Harry had begun to rethink his relationship with his family following the death of Queen Elizabeth I, hoping to heal the rift. Reports said he was “desperately” working with his ghostwriter to tone down parts of his book that were most critical of his father or other family members.

But The Telegraph reported Thursday that reports that Harry got “cold feet” about revealing royal secrets were said to be “overblown.” It’s true that the book’s original release date at the end of 2022 was pushed back to after the New Year, reportedly at Harry’s request to show respect for the mourning period following his grandmother’s death.

However, The Telegraph reported that the book finished before the queen’s death will appear “intact.” The only change is that the book will contain a short note explaining that it was written before Sept. 8.

Aside from the wrath of lawyers, Harry’s revelations could risk his future relationship with his father and other relatives. It’s been reported by the Daily Beast and other outlets that Charles won’t tolerate any “inaccurate or unfair” attacks on him or other royal family members.

Friends and royal experts have told the Daily Beast that Charles could ban Harry and his American wife Meghan Markle from his coronation in May or withhold the prince and princess titles for their children, Archie and Lilibet, if Harry criticizes Camilla, the queen consort, or if Meghan makes good on her threat to reveal more secrets about the royal family.

“All of this will certainly be unhelpful to King Charles and Queen Consort Camilla in the early months of his reign,” Fitzwilliams told the Daily Mail. “It may well widen the rift between the royal family and the Sussexes in the pivotal period leading to King Charles’ coronation.”

In its press release, Penguin Random House teased that Harry will make his mother’s 1997 death a centerpiece of his narrative, saying, “’Spare’ takes readers immediately back to one of the most searing images of the 20th century: Two young boys, two princes, walking behind their mother’s coffin as the world watched in sorrow—and horror.”

The way the publisher frames this event makes it very likely that Harry “will indict his father for obliging him to participate” in that walk before a global TV audience, Sykes said.

Harry previously suggested to Oprah Winfrey that he was traumatized by the event, saying, “ It was like I was outside of my body and just walking along doing what was expected of me, showing one tenth of the emotion that everybody else was showing. I thought, ‘This is my mum. You never even met her.’”

As for other issues that could be worrisome for Charles and other royals, Harry is likely to offer his insider’s account of the breakdown of his parents’ marriage. The duke won’t be able to avoid the “uncomfortable truth” that Charles cheated on his mother with Camilla throughout the entirety of his first marriage, Sykes said.

Harry also could discuss whether he’s forgiven his father and Camilla or whether he even holds them responsible for his mother’s death, Sykes added.

Furthermore, he could go into more detail about his feelings that he was emotionally neglected by his father, which he previously suggested in his Apple+ series with Oprah Winfrey about mental health. But Sykes said that if Harry goes further and accuses the new king of bullying, belittling, or emotionally abusing him, that could undermine Charles’ effort as king to “to cast himself as an avuncular, grandfatherly figure.”