Spare Audiobook

Does anyone even discuss anything else? Prince Harry has truly unleashed all his punches in “Spare,” and if you’re hesitant about listening, well, here’s your sign to give it a go. The audiobook is narrated by the red-haired prince himself, holding nothing back (seriously, you’ll hear everything from a king in boxer shorts doing headstands to alleviate nerve pain, to the details of his personal struggles with frostbite in certain areas).

It’s common knowledge that Harry and Meghan’s relationship with the royal family has been filled with drama, but hearing everything from Harry’s perspective and understanding the events leading up to their departure from Windsor (even predating Meghan’s involvement) reveals how this break had been brewing for decades.

Surprisingly, the true antagonist in Harry’s narrative is not his distant and critical family or the pressures of being born into royalty; it’s the media. Despite the arguments of being a “poor little rich boy,” we never truly considered the intrusiveness of constantly being pursued from birth simply due to one’s birth into a specific family.

We all remember the role the paparazzi played in Princess Diana’s death, and it’s this legacy that continues to haunt Harry to this day. It was also the biased and sometimes malicious portrayal of his wife by the press that ultimately drove him to the painful decision of severing ties and walking away.

This is not to imply that Harry’s family emerges unscathed in his revealing account. Distant, reserved, and seemingly willing to sacrifice Harry’s reputation for the sake of their own, his family’s dirty laundry is laid bare for all to see (we’re looking at you, Camilla). Above all else, the book delves into the life of a boy turned man who, despite his best efforts, cannot escape the clutches of his family, be it through societal or social pressures. He is pigeonholed from birth as second best. How does one establish their own identity under the weight of predetermined expectations, specifically the notion that they are expendable?

The royal family is said to be hurt and embarrassed by the revelations exposed by Harry, but it’s difficult not to see their embarrassment as an admission that everything Harry reveals is true. While their current approach is to deny everything (“never explain, never complain”), it appears that Harry has made a compelling argument for a fresher, more transparent interpretation of royalty. To borrow a phrase from Taylor Swift, “we’ve never heard silence quite this loud.”

Publisher Description

It was one of the most searing images of the twentieth century: two young boys, two princes, walking behind their mothers coffin as the world watched in sorrowand horror. As Princess Diana was laid to rest, billions wondered what Prince William and Prince Harry must be thinking and feelingand how their lives would play out from that point on. For Harry, this is that story at last. Before losing his mother, twelve-year-old Prince Harry was known as the carefree one, the happy-go-lucky Spare to the more serious Heir. Grief changed everything. He struggled at school, struggled with anger, with lonelinessand, because he blamed the press for his mothers death, he struggled to accept life in the spotlight. At twenty-one, he joined the British Army. The discipline gave him structure, and two combat tours made him a hero at home. But he soon felt more lost than ever, suffering from post-traumatic stress and prone to crippling panic attacks. Above all, he couldnt find true love. Then he met Meghan. The world was swept away by the couples cinematic romance and rejoiced in their fairy-tale wedding. But from the beginning, Harry and Meghan were preyed upon by the press, subjected to waves of abuse, racism, and lies. Watching his wife suffer, their safety and mental health at risk, Harry saw no other way to prevent the tragedy of history repeating itself but to flee his mother country. Over the centuries, leaving the Royal Family was an act few had dared. The last to try, in fact, had been his mother. . . . For the first time, Prince Harry tells his own story, chronicling his journey with raw, unflinching honesty. A landmark publication, Spare is full of insight, revelation, self-examination, and hard-won wisdom about the eternal power of love over grief.