The Queen’s Reading Room Festival: Tickets Now On Sale
Sunday 11th June at Hampton Court Palace, London
Dame Judi Dench | Gyles Brandreth | Ben Macintyre David Harewood | Robert Harris | Kamila Shamsie Ben Miles and many more
Read moreDiscover new books each season and meet the extraordinary people who create them
The Queen’s Reading Room is a charity working to provide opportunities for the appreciation of literature among adults and children in the UK and around the world. We seek to advance education by closing the gap between writers and readers through accessible, educational and free literary content available year-round. Our purpose is to help more people find and connect with books which enrich their lives and turn them into lifelong readers. You’ll find on this website reading recommendations, author interviews, never-before-seen archive and lots more, carefully selected by our board of trustees and their expert advisors for their educative, literary and historic merit.
Join us in reading the selected books each season, or delve into this website to discover more about the books and authors selected by Her Majesty Queen Camilla to inspire your curiosity and delight your imagination.
Find out more here.
Books keep our minds fresh and our hearts open.
There is perhaps no greater exercise in empathy than reading a book: placing oneself in another’s shoes, travelling the world and meeting its people. Reading teaches us the value and power of our imagination, as our minds paint pictures to the words and conjure new worlds we may never have dreamed of. And when we realise that power, young or old, who knows what we can achieve. Finding a great book is special; but coming together over a shared love of a story is a very precious thing indeed.
Check out our Books page for stories to make your soul soar, expand your horizons, or simply provide a gentle comfort in times when the world seems dark. Read along with us on our Instagram page, where writers and readers interact, where the reading experience is enriched by education, and where the love of a great story is shared.
Hilary Mantel’s acclaimed masterpiece is the first instalment in the Wolf Hall trilogy, tracing the rise of Thomas Cromwell under the cruel and capricious Henry VIII. A shrewd and ambitious self-made man, Cromwell emerges as a powerful force within the court, but even he is subject to the fickle wishes of a King who can offer favour as well as ruin. An impeccably researched and thoroughly immersive historical novel which…
Have you introduced your book club to The Queen’s Reading Room?
Download our book club kits for conversation starters…
which may turn into bookish debate!