Princess Kate's brother, James Middleton, has opened up about his special relationship with the late Queen Elizabeth and the void she filled in his life.

In an excerpt from his forthcoming book, Meet Ella: The Dog Who Saved My Life, recently published in the Daily Mail, Middleton discusses his mental health and suicidal ideation experiences (he credits his dog Ella for saving his life) as well as his special relationship with the former Queen of England He opened up.

“We also attended a family gathering at Christmas in Sandringham. Beatrice and Eugenie, whom I knew from school, came, and we all went to church in the morning,” Middleton wrote.

“One year the Queen and I sat down and did jigsaw puzzles. It was the kind of activity I enjoyed as a teenager with my own grandparents, all four of whom had died within three years,” he continued. 'So in a way, I felt that the Queen was filling a grandmother-sized void in my life.'

“And there we were, engaged in this daily joy. The fact that I was there with the Queen still feels unreal.”

In addition to friendly games, Middleton said the queen talked “about beekeeping,” adding that she knew the queen was particularly fond of beekeeping.

“The queen talked to me about beekeeping, and I knew she appreciated the effort required for a colony of bees to produce enough honey for a jar,” he explained. [Since becoming a beekeeper nearly a decade ago, I have been an ardent supporter of these ingenious and industrious little creatures. I now have nearly half a million bees in eight hives in my pasture in Bucklebury, and I am in awe of them."

In fact, according to Middleton, he even presented a jar of honey to the late monarch. A “gift from the queen to the queen,” he wrote, which “seemed fitting.”

“Some gifts were modest but carefully wrapped. I brought a card with Ella's picture and a few jars of my own honey for breakfast on Christmas morning.