When handsome society photographer Antony Armstrong-Jones married the glamorous and beautiful Princess Margaret, it was the stuff that dreams were made of: a wedding in Westminster Abbey watched on television by millions around the world, a romantic honeymoon on the Royal Yacht and a first home in Kensington Palace. Created Earl of Snowdon, as a young commoner brought into the traditional and ultra-conventional royal family Tony was a breath of much-needed fresh air. Yet he was also the first royal rebel, refusing to accept a subsidiary role to his wife or to walk the mandatory two steps behind her in public. After eighteen years of married life and two children, however, the fairytale turned into a nightmare and a bitter divorce. In later years, while Princess Margaret suffered with ill-health, Snowdon prospered. He made a successful, if occasionally stormy, second marriage and continued to enjoy the friendship and affection of the Queen and the Queen Mother. As a photographer, he remains among the most sought after in the world - and one of the highest paid.

Royal biographer Brian Hoey draws on personal interviews with some of Lord Snowdon's closest friends and professional colleagues. The Princess of Wales discussed the similarities between them, and Snowdon's son David, Viscount Linley describes the closeness of their relationship and the influence his father has had on him. Snowdon: Public Figure, Private Man fully and frankly explores the life of this intriguing man. It has never been more timely to look at the trailblazer who prepared the way for other commoners - Captain Mark Phillips, Lady Diana Spencer, Sarah Ferguson and Tim Laurence - to join the exclusive, if dysfunctional, Royal family.