Fleur Macdonald

This week's Shelf Lifer, Mary Quant (pictured here in 1960s), invented both the mini-skirt and hot pants. If that weren't enough, she later claimed to have invented the duvet cover. She tells us which part of the Bible she would take into solitary confinement and which character in Little Women gets her going. Her autobiography is out tomorrow. 1) As a child what did you read under the covers? Enid Blyton – My father disapproved as it was fashionably thought to be bad English. 2) Has a book ever made you cry and if so which one?   Many books and most of all those by Amelia Ann Stiggins. 3) You are about to be put in solitary confinement for a year and allowed to take three books.  What would you choose?

On this week's Shelf Life, the genial John Simpson confesses which classics he's never finished, and gives a very thorough account of which literary characters he would most like to bed. 1) As a child, what did you read under the covers? Nothing dodgy, I’m afraid. I remember being caught reading The Coral Island under the sheets at the age of eight by my father, and watching the expression of sheer relief crossing his face when he saw the title. 2) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one? I find myself becoming increasingly emotional, especially on topics involving sacrifice, forgiveness and honourable behaviour.

Mark Mason, author of Walk the Lines, is in the hot seat this week. He tells us that no woman is truly attractive unless you can imagine going to the pub with her, and admits to a fear that he may be one of Holden Caulfield's 'phonies'. 1) What are you reading at the moment?  Bob Woodward's biography of John Belushi. Yes, that Bob Woodward. Strange choice of subject for the man who brought down Nixon (as Woodward himself admits) - but it's a great read. 2) As a child, what did you read under the covers? Agatha Christie. Once boasted to my mother that I'd been awake until 4am finishing Dead Man's Folly. She was less impressed with this feat than I was. 3) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one?

This week's Shelf Life features Alain de Botton, who is currently stoking controversy with his latest book, Religion for Atheists. De Botton, who tweets @alaindebotton, tells us which book he'd give a lover and why exactly he'd like to meet Madame Bovary. 1) What are you reading at the moment? Some porn: Modern Architecture since 1900, by William Curtis. Full of beautiful images and thought-provoking words. 2) As a child, what did you read under the covers? The Lego catalogue. I still can't entirely believe that now, as an adult, I could buy myself pretty much anything from the Lego catalogue without asking anyone for permission. Sadly though, the urge to do so has gone away. 3) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one?

Fresh from sixty radio and TV appearances in 2011 alone, the popular historian and constitutional expert, Kate Williams, is on Shelf Life this week. She tells us about her religious fervours under the covers and what's worse than finding Mein Kampf on someone's bookshelf. Her first novel, The Pleasures of Men, is out tomorrow. 1) What are you reading at the moment? Marina Warner’s Stranger Magic, Vassily Grossman’s Life and Fate, and H.B. Morse’s 1920s work The Chronicles of the East India Company Trading to China — my next novel is about China in the nineteenth century. 2) As a child, what did you read under the covers? The Bible. I experienced an intensely religious phase when I was younger.

Opening presents is tough: hiding greed, masking disappointment and feigning gratitude. You're also probably being filmed for the family time capsule and you'll be on YouTube within hours. That's what happened to a poor American woman called Emily this Christmas. She's starting 2012 as the latest social media sensation. The video has been removed, but I can report that on receiving and flicking through Republican candidate Ron Paul's Liberty Defined, she burst into tears, saying: 'He just called Israel an apartheid state. I’m not reading this.' It's hard to know who comes out worse this time of year; each gift's a mutual minefield. On coming home from the holidays this year, I was greeted by a neat little parcel from my flatmate.

This week's Shelf Lifer is the indefatigable Joan Collins. She tells us which literary character she'd pick to share a bed with and exactly how many self-help books she's written. What are you reading at the moment? Frank Sinatra: The Boudoir Singer by Danforth Prince and Darwin Porter As a child, what did you read under the covers? Forever Amber by Kathleen Windsor Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one? Yes, Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist when Bill Sikes murders Nancy because it's the most harrowing description of a murder that I’ve ever read You are about to be put into solitary confinement for a year and allowed to take three books. What would you choose?

If Time Magazine declared 2011 the year of the protester, then it seems quite fitting that, in a public vote, the  Galaxy Book Awards crowned Caitlin Moran's How to Be a Woman their book of the year. Touted as a modern day feminist call-to-arms, it is also the memoirs of a former music journalist turned Times commentator professional tweeter (hashtag commentweeter). It's sort of a roughed up version of Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée but funnier and relocated to the messy days of the late seventies, as if S de B had dumped her drain of a boyfriend and had plonked herself next to you at a party, triple shot of gin and (full fat) tonic in hand. Less Parisian and more Wolverhampton, mind you.

This week, Paul Torday tells us about his fear of appearing on the stage, and reveals what he’d put on the GCSE English Literature syllabus. His new novel, The Legacy of Hartlepool Hall, is published today. 1) As a child what did you read under the covers? I used to read the Narnia books by C.S. Lewis, with the wonderful Pauline Baynes illustrations. My two favourites were The Horse and his Boy, and The Silver Chair. 2) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one? I can’t think of any book that has made me cry. I cry every Christmas when they screen The Railway Children (the original version with Jenny Agutter and Lionel Blair). The ending always takes me by surprise.

This week Ian Rankin tells us which Jilly Cooper heroine he would sleep with and the title he'd give his self-help book. 1) As a child, what did you read under the covers?  Enid Blyton books and lots and lots of comics (Victor, Hotspur, plus annuals dedicated to those same comics).   2) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one?  I had a lump in my throat towards the end of David Nichols' One Day.... 3) You are about to be put into solitary confinement for a year and allowed to take three books. What would you choose?  Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon, Bleak House by Charles Dickens, Lanark by Alasdair Gray. 4) Which literary character would you most like to sleep with?

Jeffrey Archer is on this week's Shelf Life. He lets us know what practical gift he'd give a lover for Christmas (apart from his latest bestseller Only Time Will Tell) and what spotting the Labour Manifesto on someone's shelf might make him do... 1) What are you reading at the moment? Boomerang by Michael Lewis   2) As a child, what did you read under the covers? Ian Fleming   3) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one? A Time to Love and a Time to Die, Erich Maria Remarque   4) You are about to be put into solitary confinement for a year and allowed to take three books. What would you choose? I was, for two years!