Q. Which other EAFOL 2016 participant are you most excited about? I’m excited about so many participants, especially Meera Syal, whom I’ve been a fan of for years, Jenny Colgan, Victoria Hislop, Gill Hornby, Helen Dunmore, Holly Smale, Lauren Child and Robert Lindsay. I’m keen to hear Khalid Al Ameri speak, too and I’m over-excited about Jacqueline Wilson on behalf of my daughter but, if I had to name one person I’m keen to say hello to it would be Commander Hadfield as I've followed him on Instagram for a while and always loved the images of Earth he used to send back from the ISS. Q. Which book(s) are you reading now? I’ve just finished Her by Harriet Lane, which was a great thriller, and I’m about to start The Island by Victoria Hislop. Q. Which literary character would you invite to dinner? And why? Charlie and Lola, because they make me laugh and I kind of miss my kids being that little. I wouldn’t serve tomatoes, and they could have as much pink milk as they liked and I’d let them stay up till after midnight. Q. There have been some interesting additions to the dictionary over the years. Which word would you remove? All of the text-speak abbreviations such as ‘tomoz’ and ‘jel’. Just wrong. Q. Who would write the story of your life? The late Nora Ephron. In her hands, the book would likely be better than the reality.