Duchess Catherine's "middle class family" have helped Prince William break away from his "dysfunctional past".

Duchess Catherine and Prince William

Duchess Catherine and Prince William

In her new book, 'Diana's Babies: Kate, William And The Repair Of A Broken Family', author Angela Levin says the Middleton family have been a calming influence on William - who has children Prince George, two and four-month-old Princess Charlotte with Catherine - and helped to soften him.

She writes: "The Middletons' informality and William's growing confidence as a father has clearly softened the shy second-in-line to the throne, who has a dislike of conspicuous attention and a wariness of photographers verging on the paranoid."

Calling the recent christening of William's daughter Princess Charlotte a turning point, she added: "Few of those watching in the summer sunshine would have remarked upon it, but this stroll with a Millson Prince pram showed that William had finally broken away from his dysfunctional past. And this, I believe, is largely due to the calming influence of his wife and her close-knit middle class family.

"William insisted, against tradition, that the Middletons featured prominently in the portraits."

"William is no longer inhibited about expressing his emotions in public. Kate's devotion, confidence and love had helped him trust his feelings.

"Above all, the change is clear in William himself, who is no longer the withdrawn, slightly angry presence from the past, but a smiling prince at ease with himself and those he meets."

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