The Governess tells the story of Marion 'Crawfie' Crawford, the progressive young woman who, as royal governess for seventeen years, lived on the most intimate terms with the future Queen Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret. This is a look into the childhood of the world's longest reigning monarch: a story of conflict and contradiction, of state dinners and hunger marches, of a left-winger amongst the ultimate conservatives, of a modern woman in an ancient institution. An instant Sunday Times bestseller.