Royal secrets: Why people love tell-all books

Duchess Meghan, born Markle, has been described by as a "fire-breathing dragon," while Duchess Kate, born Middleton, is an "angel."

Clear-cut and simple: That is how countless tabloid magazines around the world report on the British royals. Readers can go ahead and choose sides without ever knowing if those representations correspond to reality. Portraying figures as good or evil makes for strong headlines, sells newspapers and magazines as well as books that have one thing in common: They promise new, explosive, previously unpublished information about the royal family.

The making of a modern royal family

That is also true of the recently published book, Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family, by US reporters Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand. It was widely advertised as investigative, but it has nothing to do with the deep political reporting. Instead of socially relevant information, it's about private details, preferences, idiosyncrasies.

"Political scandal revelations are not on the same level as publications about politicians' or royals' alleged character weaknesses," Joachim Trebbe, a communications scientist at Berlin's Free University told DW. "Books about the British royal family appeal to a certain target group that is well informed by tabloid magazines and hopes to gain deeper insights." These readers usually know exactly when Duchess Kate wore which dress and why the former Spanish King Juan Carlos has gone underground, he adds.

Royal family as a projection screen

People are curious about a family that seems no less dysfunctional than their own — which results in "parasocial interaction," Trebbe points out: "Jane Smith relates to Queen Elizabeth because she and the queen have the same problems with their grandsons."

The royal family provides the input for this kind of connectivity: Intrigues are a matter of course behind the glamorous facade. The queen does not have a framed photo of Harry, Meghan and little Archie on her desk for her Christmas speech; Kate is more popular than Meghan; William warns his brother about Meghan; Harry is not only madly in love with Meghan, but is tired of the monarchical hierarchy anyway. Finding Freedom suggests Harry was the driving force behind the break with the royal house, not Meghan.

But does this alleged news justify an entire biography? "That is the thin line these books have to walk," according to Trebbe. "They have to connect to what everyone knows and take it from there." But whether the book sells well depends on how many new tidbits it has to offer, he adds.

This is not only true for publications about Britain's royal family but also for books about politicians. Numerous tell-all books have been published about US President Donald Trump, including the recent Too Much and Never Enough by one of Trump's nieces, Mary Trump, and Fear: Trump in the White House by renowned investigative journalist Bob Woodward, who uncovered the Watergate scandal in 1974. But Trump is still in office, and it seems the publications only confirm the prevailing image of a person unfit for the presidency.

But just like with the US president, negative reports are water off a duck's back in the case of Britain's royals, too. "Withdrawal from the court is a relatively normal process anyway, it runs through the European royal houses," Trebbe argues. Back in the 1990s, the divorce of Harry's parents Charles and Diana was also treated like a scandal.

Even if tabloids have tried to turn "Megxit" into a scandal, Harry and Meghan's departure from the court remains a relatively harmless episode, especially compared to the unsolved role of the Queen's second son, Prince Andrew, in the Jeffrey Epstein sex crimes case. Revelations surrounding his involvement in that case might lead to a scandal that actually deserves the name.