1933. Marion Crawford accepts the role of a lifetime, tutoring their Royal Highnesses Elizabeth and Margaret Rose. Her one stipulation to their parents the Duke and Duchess of York is that she bring some doses of normalcy into the sheltered and privileged lives of the two young princesses. At Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, and Balmoral, Marion defies oppressive court protocol to take the girls on tube trains, swimming at public baths, and Christmas shopping trips at Woolworth's. During the war, as Hitler's Heinkels fly over Windsor, she shelters her charges in the castle dungeons. But being beloved governess and confidante to the Windsor family has a cost: Marion puts her private life on hold until released from royal service following Princess Elizabeth's marriage in 1947. -- adapted from publisher info