WHATBOOK..?

. ..are you reading now? THE book I am halfway through right now is Elizabeth II by Nicholas Davies. I am speechless at the things that go on when the visitors are cleared out of Buck House, and comforted by the humanness of the Royal Family. Being a dyed-in-the-wool royalist (if I could, I would dress up like Charles II, or Puss in Boots — only public ridicule stops me!), I lap up all I can get on Liz II.

. ..would you take to a desert island?

MY FIRST reaction is that I’d take a beginner’s guide to boatbuilding, but as I am poor at woodwork, I would not like to be put to sea in any boat made by me. I would need a book with a lot of pages, one that I could relate to and which echoes my happy life, so — assuming toilet paper is already available on my island — it would have to be The Kenneth Williams Diaries by Russell Davies. All life is there: sadness, hilarity, memories. I have read it twice, but it could easily be as fresh on the third reading as the first, and perhaps even funnier. A book I could re-read for ever.

. ..first gave you the reading bug?

I WAS first turned on to reading — well, looking at pictures really — by my Rupert books. Rupert took an ordinary little boy on adventures beyond the clouds, and a bear with human hands never struck me as odd. When I tackled the words, I could dream with my eyes open. Wonderful stuff. After Rupert, the sailing stories by Arthur Ransome — Swallows And Amazons, then all his others — held me spellbound, resulting in my lifelong love of small boat sailing.

. ..left you cold?

AS A boy I was supposed to like books about real pirates, but they left me cold — as did books about football, too. Oh, and to name names, I could not summon up any interest in Black Beauty by Anna Sewell. The book I recall with great affection is my father’s old copy of Cervante’s Don Quixote illustrated by Gustave Dore which, rather than turning me on to reading, turned me on to illustration.

LIttLe PrInCess: I Don’t Want to Wash My Hands by tony ross is out now, published by Andersen Press at £6.99. n