Queen Camilla has joined forces with the Queen of Belgium on an important issue.
Queen Mathilde, 51, showed her support for Queen Camilla’s charity book club and revealed her three favourite novels.
The Queen of Belgium listed The Burgundians by Bart Van Loo, Celebration of the Everyday by Colette Nys-Mazure and Those Who Forget by Géraldine Schwarz.
The wife of King Philippe praises the fellow Belgium and author of The Burgundians for bringing “the powerfully evocative Middle Ages to life.”
Queen Camilla (middle) has joined forces with the Queen of Belgium (left) on an important issue.
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She added: “In a very colourful and entertaining style, he tells the reader how the dukes of Burgundy shaped what we know as the Low Countries: Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and the north of France. He succeeds in transforming the historical characters into real flesh-and-blood people you would love to have known. Do not be put off by the 600 pages; this book reads like a thriller.”
The Belgian Queen hoped that the book club members reflected on the lessons of hope, a prominent theme in her second recommendation ,The Celebration of Everyday.
Speaking on the book, the Belgian Queen said: “Colette Nys-Masure’s wonderful book invites us to appreciate the little things in our lives because, in the routine of everyday life, we are often elsewhere, absent from ourselves, deaf to the continuous miracle that is our ordinary life. I hope her lesson in hope appeals to you as much as it did to me.”
Speaking about her third recommendation, Winner of the European Book Prize 2018, the mother of four added: “In Those Who Forget, Géraldine Schwarz dares to evaluate her family tree by retelling her family history.”
The Belgium Queen has previously joined Queen Camilla at Buckingham Palace on International Women’s Day in March 2022
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“Queen Mathilde added: This book questions our European past and present. It invites us to reflect upon how nations should deal with collective guilt, and how to ensure we remember.
“This is a book you are likely to discuss with family and friends, or in class.”
The Belgium Queen has previously joined Queen Camilla at Buckingham Palace on International Women’s Day in March 2022, the year after the book club was launched.
Queen Camilla’s motivation behind creating the book club in 2021 was to promote the power of reading and bring people together to help enrich their lives.
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Queen Camilla’s motivation behind creating the book club in 2021 was to promote the power of reading and bring people together to help enrich their lives.
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Camilla wrote: “With their extraordinary power to educate and inspire, books – from authors around the globe – have enriched my life since I was a child.
She added: “It has therefore been such a joy to watch my Reading Room grow over the years into a thriving book community. Now a charity, I hope that we, together with our partners, can foster in adults and children alike a lifelong love of literature and connect more people with that special magic that can only be found in the leaves of a book.”
The CEO of The Queen’s Reading Room, Vicki Perrin, said they were “delighted to be able to share these very special recommendations” from the Belgian Queen.
Other celebrity fans of the club include Dame Judi Dench and Richard E. Grant.