India Hicks

The world...

hear the news, except for the royal party who are in this very remote spot.

She goes up the ladder as Princess Elizabeth and she comes down as a queen.

Of course, they go back to Senga Lodge and it took some time for the news to reach them.

Again, the really extraordinary part of this story recounted by my mother is that it then took them some time to leave Senga Lodge to get back to Nairobi for the queen, obviously, to return to England to ascend to the throne.

By the time they reach the airport, the world's press

had landed the news and had descended on the airport.

As a sign of respect for our Queen in mourning, they put their cameras on the ground.

There is not one photograph of the Queen leaving Nairobi Airport.

Isn't that an amazing thing today?

That's absolutely right.

In fact, she said to the very small royal party gathered when the news came through, she said, I am so sorry, but this means we're going to have to return to England.

The person, I think, who took it worse was Prince Philip.

And when he heard the news, Mike Parker said, who was the private secretary, said he covered his face with the newspaper and said, this is going to be devastating.

So I did the book on my mother and we've luckily caught some kind of algorithm and the book has sold incredibly well.

It's a beautiful picture book.

But I think being 97 years and still alive, people are fascinated by this extraordinary life that will never happen again.

It was a very unique life, even though my mother afterwards really sort of lived in the shadows.

I mean...

At one stage, I wanted to call it out of the shadow because she lived in the shadow of her great parents.