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Mike Tindall has given a fresh insight into what life is really like as a member of the Royal Family in his new book, which was released on Thursday. The former rugby player co-authored The

Good, The Bad and The Rugby - Unleashed with James Haskell and Alex Payne, and dedicated a whole chapter to what life is like in the Royal Family, with the rest of the book focusing

centrally on sport. While Mike, who is married to Princess Anne’s daughter Zara Tindall, is often seen at formal royal events such as the Coronation, he also spends a lot of time with his

wife’s family behind closed doors and insists they are just like any "normal" family. The dad-of-three also shared special moments he has enjoyed with the family in the book,

including during a Scottish family holiday where he speaks fondly about his daughter Mia and a picture of her sharing lunch with her great grandfather Prince Philip. The image was taken a

year or two before his death in 2021. Mike wrote: "There's a great picture of my daughter Mia sitting with the Duke of Edinburgh that captures exactly what those afternoons were

like: members of a very close family who loved each other dearly spending precious time together. "Yes, there's a lot of drama surrounding the Royal Family, but they aren't

much different to anyone else underneath it all. "Lunches were also relaxed, especially up in Scotland, where lunch would often be heading out into the open space of the Scottish

Highlands for a picnic." As well as sharing meals, the family also enjoyed watching TV together, with Mike sharing an insight into his relationship with the late Queen. He wrote:

"I'm sometimes asked if the Queen did informality like 'normal' people, and the answer to that is yes. Her life wasn't like an episode of Downton Abbey, with meals

on long tables and everyone dressed in their finery every night, and Zara and I would often watch the racing with her on TV, as I'm sure lots of people reading this have done with their

gran." Mike also raised eyebrows when he suggested joining the Royal Family was "easy", a direct contrast to the way Meghan Markle has suggested it can be. The 46-year-old,

who married Zara in 2011 and went on to have three children, wrote: "Believe it or not, marrying into the Royal Family was pretty easy for me. They were always nice to me, and I was

always nice to them. Simple really." The book was released on October 24, the same day as the paperback version of Prince Harry’s book Spare also hit the shelves in the UK.