This is the first biography of King Michael of Romania for many years. Based on royal archives, Queen Helen's unpublished diaries, sources in Romania, and interviews with King Michael, Queen Helen and Crown Princess Margarita, it integrates the story of Michael with that of the country which he once ruled, and which he once tried to save. Michael was the only constitutional monarch to have led his people in person during the Second World War. After refusing to be a puppet to give legitimacy to the regime Hitler had set up in Romania he led a coup d'etat against the Germans which shortened the war and postponed the communist dictatorship of his country. For three years, from 1944-7, with the Soviet army in occupation, the Western Allies unable to help, and the two main democratic parties virtually destroyed, he hung on grimly to some degree of constitutional democracy until Stalin showed his hand. Exiled after the war for fifty years, Michael continued to be regarded with affection and support by the Romanian people.
