The Queen and I Books in Order
Part ofSue Townsend Books in OrderExplore The Queen and I series by Sue Townsend in order, with summaries of her satire about the Royal Family living as ordinary people on a council estate.
Last updated: December 25, 2025
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Publication Order
2 books
Queen Camilla
by Sue Townsend
2006
Set more than a decade after the monarchy is abolished, Queen Elizabeth, Charles and Camilla are still exiled on a private, fenced-off estate ruled by a petty tycoon. Political tides turn, and Townsend uses the chaos to lampoon celebrity culture, populism and royal mythmaking.
The Queen and I
by Sue Townsend
1992
When a republican party wins a general election and abolishes the monarchy, the Royal Family is evicted from Buckingham Palace and rehoused on a bleak Midlands council estate. Townsend turns their struggle with benefits forms, cramped kitchens and suspicious neighbours into pointed, humane political comedy.
Series background & context
The books grouped under The Queen and I imagine what might happen if the British monarchy were swept aside and forced to live like everyone else.
Instead of palaces and processions, they are handed a set of keys to a small house on a struggling estate.
In The Queen and I a newly elected republican government abolishes the monarchy and evicts the House of Windsor from Buckingham Palace. The Queen, now simply Mrs Windsor, along with Prince Philip, Charles, Diana and the rest of the family, are rehoused in Hellebore Close, a Midlands council street nicknamed Hell Close by its long-suffering residents.
Townsend has great fun with the practical details. Used to servants and protocol, the Queen has to learn how to work a coin-operated meter, queue at the doctor's surgery and stretch a basic pension through the week. Prince Philip sulks in bed, Charles dreams of a simple life with his vegetable patch, and the younger royals rub shoulders with neighbours who have no time for deference.
The comedy comes from small clashes of expectation. A social worker turns up instead of a private secretary, the local shop replaces royal caterers, and the Queen's corgis discover what life is like without palace lawns. Yet the book also lets estate residents and former royals meet each other halfway, showing how poverty, pride and gossip shape everyone, titled or not.
Years later Queen Camilla returns to the same universe. The Royals are still confined to a fenced-off area known as the Flowers Exclusion Zone, run like a private kingdom by a scaffolding magnate. Charles and Camilla are living together there, the political climate has shifted again and the question of restoring the monarchy has started to surface, drawing in old neighbours and new power brokers.
The Queen in Hell Close offers a concentrated glimpse of this world, focusing on life in and around the estate and on the daily humiliations and small victories that follow when a former head of state has to wrestle with loose roof tiles, benefit forms and nosy neighbours.
Across the sequence Townsend blends broad, affectionate satire with a detailed portrait of council-estate life in the 1990s and 2000s. Readers can expect sharp political jokes, gentle digs at royal habits and a surprising amount of warmth for characters on both sides of the palace gates.
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