pproximately twenty minutes past midnight, as Lady Diana Spencer was driven from Ritz Paris hotel to Pont d’Alma tunnel in Paris, France, where she ultimately died, her “displeasure” was caught on camera.

Diana’s displeasure, as The Diana Chronicles uncovered, was understood most by one photographer, Arthur Edwards, who had been covering the people's princess for 16 years.

In the eighties and nineties, his bread and butter relied on covering Diana as she went on to become the world’s first celebrity from being a young, coy teenaged princess.

As a royal princess, she never needed to sneak out. She was accustomed to the red carpet being rolled out for her. But when she began cutting ties with the British royalty, she also lost the privileges that came with it. And so, on that fateful night, she had to sneak out through the back door of the Ritz, because the paparazzi were circling the front entrance. She need not even be at the hotel that was peppered with other prominent guests and therefore covered with press activity.

The only reason the former Princess of Wales (also known as the people’s princess and the world’s most famous celebrity) was even as the Ritz Paris was because her beau at the time, Dodi Fayed, was showing off his properties (owned by his father) to Diana. Ritz Paris was among one of those properties. She could’ve avoided the media pandemonium completely that contributed to her death had she stayed at a private property and was not being shown the hotel.

To add fuel to fire, neither the government of France nor the officials in the upper echelon of power in Great Britain even knew she was in Paris. Dodi Fayed had the money to protect her, but he was also a conspicuous playboy who had no understanding of the moods and temperament of Diana.

Before her relationship with Dodi started, what Diana did know is that after leaving the security provided by the palace, she needed someone who could provide that security and Dodi was the man. “He has all the toys,” she is quoted in the book. The Diana Chronicles also revealed that Diana always knew that post her separation and divorce from Prince Charles (now King Charles III), the United States of America was the place she had to relocate to because celebrity culture in the USA was so widespread that it would’ve take some attention away from her.

These are just some revelations you can find in The Diana Chronicles by Tina Brown. In fact, instead of a couple of sources, the reason the book feels so insightful is because Tina Brown spoke to approximately 250 sources (men and women) with most maintaining anonymity.

The Diana Chronicles is the perfect non-fiction book these days as the fifth season of The Crown has been released in entirety by Netflix. The series, a work of historical fiction, has taken many liberties in presenting its perspective but while the characters are real, the story is made to suit the entire production. Many have also mistaken it as a truthful presentation. Alas, it is not.

The only reason the former Princess of Wales (also known as the people’s princess and the world’s most famous celebrity) was even as the Ritz Paris was because her beau at the time, Dodi Fayed, was showing off his properties (owned by his father) to Diana. She could’ve avoided the media pandemonium completely that contributed to her death had she stayed at a private property and was not being shown the hotel that was peppered with other prominent names.

On the other hand, Tina Brown has done the opposite by trying to research not just the days leading up to her death in Paris in 1997 but also gone down the rabbit hole to find just who Diana was and what really happened that compelled her to cut ties with then-Prince (now-King Charles III).

It also covers in great detail her complicated yet loving relationship with Hasnat Khan that went on for two years and its reason for collapsing. Khan, as the book noted, had made it clear that he didn’t want to marry Diana and consequently become a part of her entourage. And he couldn’t give her the protocol of security that she needed given her popularity even as she had removed herself from the British monarchy.

Dodi, the playboy, could protect her. She had realized, as the book presents, early on that Dodi was his father’s “puppet” but since the senior Dodi showed no contempt for her while the junior Dodi had the money, she felt safe.

At the same time, as Charles was becoming more public about his relationship with Camilla Parker-Bowles after his marriage began to break down, Diana, according to The Diana Chronicles, was seeing approximately four therapists, as she was fighting bulimia and the loss of a home, much like her early childhood when her mother left her father.

From private secretaries to courtiers of Diana’s time as princess and what followed until her untimely death is not sugarcoated. But the prose is beautiful.

The reason The Diana Chronicles is so riveting is because the sources used in the book come from Diana’s private circle. Furthermore, Tina Brown spent a period of over 18 months in getting her research right. This list includes even talking to former Prime Minister of Great Britain, Tony Blair. It also delves deeper into Andrew Morton’s book, where Diana is quoted verbatim.

More than the research that went into The Crown, The Diana Chronicles is a vivid account of Diana with accurate research backing it. The author walks us through Diana’s early days to her post-divorce era, the effort she made to make her marriage work, the ultimate breakdown, her relationship with Hollywood figures, instead of spinning conspiracy theories.

Any book that manages such a tough subject and does justice to it, is deserving of applause. Read it because it will create a new perspective about the people’s princess that goes beyond The Crown’s historical fictional tale, brought to life by terrific actors such as Emma Corin and Elizabeth Debicki. Do they get mannerisms right, particularly the latter? Yes, but do they offer an accurate account of who Diana was and the British constitutional monarchy, not at all. As Judi Dench, Andrew Morton and other figures dismiss The Crown as fiction and not fact, they maybe onto something.