IT MAY NOT HAVE BEEN apparent at the time, but Britain dodged a bullet in 1936 when King Edward VIII—denied his choice to marry American socialite Wallis Simpson— abdicated the throne for the woman he loved. Alexander Larman covered the abdication in his previous book, and he picks up the story in after Edward’s younger brother becomes King George VI. The former king now assumes a diminished status as the Duke of Windsor as Britain advances
