Una-Mary’s last chapter — diamonds are forever

LONDON society is in mourning. The sparkling Una-Mary Parker, prolific romantic novelist and former social editor of Tatler magazine, has died peacefully at home aged 89.

‘She was working on another novel and still wearing her pearls and diamonds,’ her daughter, Baba, tells me.

Una-Mary said her childhood was ‘terribly similar to the Queen’s’. ‘She and I were the last people in the country who didn’t go to school,’ explained Una-Mary. ‘I had two English governesses, one French [one], and a piano teacher.’

Married to society photographer Archie Parker, a kinsman of Andrew Parker Bowles, she parted from him amicably after 22 years and then enjoyed a love affair with actor Edward Duke who encouraged her to start writing novels.

Her debut, entitled Riches — about lust among the jet-set and aristocracy — was an instant bestseller.

In 2010, she was assaulted by a burglar at the beautiful Georgian house close to Harrods where she lived for 65 years.

But, with scores of friends — including Dame Joan Collins — and two children, seven grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren, she felt immensely blessed and celebrated her birthday last month, says Baba, ‘with champagne and canapés’.