This week with Burnley-born crime novelist and USA awards nominee STEPHEN BOOTH

MEMORY: My second day at school. I don't quite remember the first day, but I hated it so much that I refused to go on the second day. My mum pushed me through the gates and I cried my eyes out.

FRIEND: Twins who lived up the road from us in Blackpool. I thought their family was very posh because they not only had a car, they had a garage to put it in!

HERO: Ray Pointer, who was centre forward for Burnley FC in their glory days. When I was small, my granddad used to take me to watch Burnley at Turf Moor.

DRINK: At a New Year's Eve party in a friend's house. I sampled everything alcoholic that was on offer, fell over several times and was sick in their hallway.

HOLIDAY: When I was 10 years old, we flew from Blackpool Airport to the Isle of Man during the TT races. The only holiday my dad could get from the Goss printing press works at Preston were in June, which meant I had to get time off school to go - and that made it even better.

JOB: A holiday job washing up in a restaurant in Blackpool. The only thing that made it tolerable was the free meals. Later, I found myself teaching in a big comprehensive school and that made the washing up job seem like heaven.

CAR: An ancient VW Beetle called Oscar, who just died on me. PET: I had a cat I called Maddy. But I failed to get her spayed, and suddenly found I had SIX cats.

HOME: A tiny flat at Wardle, near Rochdale, after I married my wife Lesley. We shared it with the six cats for a while.

RECORD: The Beatles' "All My Lovin'" EP from 1963. I still have it, and the sleeve notes starts: "John, Paul, George and Ringo - names that meant nothing 18 months ago."

LOVE: I went right through my teens, student days and even a spell at a teacher training college that was 95 per cent female without falling in love with anybody until I met Lesley. We've been married for 23 years.

LIE: I needed to wear glasses from being about 10 years old, but I wouldn't admit it. I was caught out when I went trainspotting and the other lads noticed I was writing down the wrong train numbers. I couldn't see the numbers, so I was just making them up. Now that I write novels, making things up has become my living!

PUBLISHED WORK: As a newspaper reporter, one of my first efforts was a story about a blackbird that had built its nest on top of a works clock. It was full of awful puns about 'time flying' and 'second hand accommodation'. I like to think my writing had improved a bit by the time my first novel Black Dog was published.