First of all, thank you so much to everybody who tuned in to my new Daily Beast / The Royalist podcast last night.

I was so nervous beforehand! I knew the community I have worked so hard to build was there, and I knew people would show up for me, so I do not really know why I was nervous, but I couldn’t help it.

I suppose that is just how you always feel with any big new project you have poured a lot of time and energy into.

Anyway, it went absolutely brilliantly.

We had an amazing roster of guests: Andrew Lownie, Paula Froelich, Plum Sykes, and Shauna Kay, and it exceeded my wildest dreams by a million.

I am incredibly grateful to those of you who gave me an hour of your valuable time and chose to spend it with me. I really hope it was worth it.

The funny thing is that I only ever started the YouTube channel because I wanted to create a shop window that would send people to my Substack, and it certainly has done that. So many of my new subscribers have come from YouTube, and it has been a brilliant way to get out there.

But you guys on Subsatck come first.

I know that as well as giving me your valuable time, you also give me your valuable dollars, and that creates a very different relationship.

So many people have reached into their pockets and paid for a subscription, and I am grateful to you all, because I have a few Substack subscriptions myself, and I know how they can start to add up on top of everything else: Netflix, Spotify, Amazon, Audible. Before you know it, you are carrying a lot of subscriptions.

So I really do not take it lightly.

You guys on Substack are the absolute core of my work life these days. You are my “thousand true fans.”

You are the reason I have been able to build this incredible new career as a multi-platform storyteller covering the most extraordinary story in the world: the story of the British royal family.

I launched on August 2 last year, and, well, as Napoleon said, the first requirement for a soldier is that he be lucky. The Prince Andrew-Jeffrey Epstein story has been a compelling one indeed, with a significant supporting role played by the ongoing Harry and Meghan drama.

There is a lot to catch up on, so without further ado, here are some of the stories that have been occupying us over the past few days that I maybe should have sent out sooner, had I not been so busy doing the podcast.

My regular readers will be aware that there was a bit of controversy around a post by one of my readers, @kingwilliamv, who is closely involved with the veterans community, about the Invictus Games.

The comment was mysteriously deleted. Substack says I may have accidentally deleted it myself while replying, and I am choosing to accept that explanation because I still want to believe Substack is made up of good people.

In any case, I got back in touch with the reader and asked them to tell me the full story of their experience. Here is an edited version of what they sent me, reproduced with permission.