June’s instalment of The Year of Short Stories is The Queen’s Birthday Telegram. Released as one of a limited number of digital shorts released to celebrate the publication of Jeffrey Archer’s magnificent seventh short-story collection, Tell Tale. Taken from And Thereby Hangs A Tale, Jeffrey Archer’s sixth collection of short stories, The Queen’s Birthday Telegram is an irresistible, witty and ingenious short read. Albert Webber and his wife Betty are utterly thrilled when he receives the honour of a telegram from the Queen, on the occasion of his hundredth birthday. The whole town celebrates in style, and Albert looks forward to the time when – in three years – his beloved wife can also celebrate with her own telegram. But when Betty’s birthday comes, there is no telegram. Albert decides to take this up with the Palace . . .
Author
Jeffrey is published in 114 countries and more than 47 languages, with more than 750,000 5* reviews with international sales passing 275 million copies. He is the only author ever to have been a number one bestseller in fiction (nineteen times), short stories (four times) and non-fiction (The Prison Diaries). Jeffrey has been married for 53 years to Dame Mary Archer DBE. They have two sons, William and James, three grandsons and two granddaughters, and divide their time between homes in London, Cambridge and Mallorca.
