WHAT BOOK would presenter and writer Konnie Huq take to a desert island? 

. . . are you reading now?

I’ve just started reading The Future We Choose: Surviving The Climate Crisis by Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac.

Often there’s a clash between political strategy and tackling the climate crisis, but this book brings together the former Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and a senior political strategist, so it’s a win-win situation.

It couldn’t be more important and timely. It’s quite literally a call to action.

. . . would you take to a desert island?

This is so hard . . . it would really depend on what mood I was in when I was leaving for the island! I’m going to say the A Song Of Ice And Fire series [which was adapted into TV show Game Of Thrones] — it would be time-consuming, entertaining, and it comes highly recommended.

I have never really understood fantasy literature, but I’m willing to take a gamble and give these a go, and if they convert me — all the better. On my return from the island I’d be looking forward to seeing how the series ended! I was really disappointed by the end of the TV show.

. . . first gave you the reading bug?

Superfudge by Judy Blume. Before this book I was a reluctant reader and I found books a bit of a chore. I thought they weren’t for me and preferred ones that had pictures.

This is the first book I really devoured — I fell in love with it from the very first page and read it cover to cover. I remember it made me feel very grown-up.

. . . left you cold?

I feel mean calling out a book here — it’s so hard for authors to get coverage and, without a review or a recommendation, books are just rectangles on shelves.

They are so subjective, one person’s ‘book I couldn’t put down’ is another’s ‘book I threw across the room’.

Having said that, I had to read Julius Caesar for my English GCSE — this is going back about 30 years and it could be because I was a bit too immature at the time — and I didn’t find it a page-turner by any stretch of the imagination.

I can’t say that I’m that big on Shakespeare in general, although I was lucky enough to see the Upstart Crow play [about Shakespeare] just before lockdown and it was side-splittingly funny. 

• Konnie Huq is an ambassador for The Reading Agency’s Summer Reading Challenge, which runs from June to September (sillysquad.org.uk), as well as the author and illustrator of Cookie And The Most Annoying Boy In The World (Piccadilly Press, £6.99).