In John Burningham's enchanting and truthful compendium of childhood the well known and the unknown contribute funny, moving, magical and occasionally dark childhood memories. From Michael Palin's memory of seaside holildays with his dad and Seamus Heaney's evocation of a crashed Cadbury's chocolate van 'a trail of silver papers up the road') to the institutional upbringing of the mixed-race child of a black GI in the 1950s and a typical rural childhood in the Scottish highlands, it is full of evocative memories. And woven into the mix is a rich selection of quotation and fifty of John Burningham's distinctive, witty and poignant drawings.

Full list of contributors: Kofi Annan, Jeffrey Archer, Margaret Atwood, Cornelia Bathurst, Kathleen Cassidy, Jung Chang, Brian Cox, Sophie Dahl, Sir Josslyn Gore-Booth, Yoram Gross, Roger Hancock, Seamus Heaney, Patricia Hodge, Rolf Inhauser, Penelope Lively, Marina Mahler, Patty McArthur, John Major, Tom Maschler, Deborah Moggach, Andrew O'Hagan, Onora O'Neill, Michael Palin, Jan Pienkowski, Tim Pigott-Smith, Billy de Quick, Maurice Sendak, Rt Revd David Sheppard, Posy Simmonds, Sylvia Syms, Donna Tartt, Alexander Thynn (Marquess of Bath), Benjamin Zephaniah.