Cultural historian Siân Evans has worked for the National Trust, the V&A and the Design Museum, and is the author of several works of social history including Mrs Ronnie: The Society Hostess Who Collected Kings, The Manor Reborn and Life Below Stairs.Siân lives in London.

So entertaining - and there's lots of insider fun to be had... Excels at anecdotes and punchlines... The strength of Queen Bees is its wealth of detail and its author's nose for a human story... This book dances in and out of its subject to the sound of plate-smashing, cut-glass gossip, ukeleles, Beecham's orchestras, jazz bands, Nazi anthems and bombs. "I've been to a marvellous party," wrote Noël Coward. Thanks to Queen Bees, we can feel as though we were there too.

Cultural historian Siân Evans has worked for the National Trust, the V&A and the Design Museum, and is the author of several works of social history including Mrs Ronnie: The Society Hostess Who Collected Kings, The Manor Reborn and Life Below Stairs.Siân lives in London.

So entertaining - and there's lots of insider fun to be had... Excels at anecdotes and punchlines... The strength of Queen Bees is its wealth of detail and its author's nose for a human story... This book dances in and out of its subject to the sound of plate-smashing, cut-glass gossip, ukeleles, Beecham's orchestras, jazz bands, Nazi anthems and bombs. "I've been to a marvellous party," wrote Noël Coward. Thanks to Queen Bees, we can feel as though we were there too.

Cultural historian Siân Evans has worked for the National Trust, the V&A and the Design Museum, and is the author of several works of social history including Mrs Ronnie: The Society Hostess Who Collected Kings, The Manor Reborn and Life Below Stairs.Siân lives in London.

So entertaining - and there's lots of insider fun to be had... Excels at anecdotes and punchlines... The strength of Queen Bees is its wealth of detail and its author's nose for a human story... This book dances in and out of its subject to the sound of plate-smashing, cut-glass gossip, ukeleles, Beecham's orchestras, jazz bands, Nazi anthems and bombs. "I've been to a marvellous party," wrote Noël Coward. Thanks to Queen Bees, we can feel as though we were there too.