10 Books You Can't Put Down,
The Pillars of the Earth
A Thousand Splendid Suns
New Moon
Pope JoanThe Girl Who Played With Fire
The Kite Runner
The Other Boleyn Girl
World Without End
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
The Thirteenth Tale

I missed my stop on buses and trains on more than one occasion because I've been so engrossed in what I'm reading – most memorably/worryingly when I was racing to the end of Robert Rankin's latest novel on a late night bus, ahead of an interview with him the next day. I eventually roused myself from The Toyminator – comic fantasy is not my usual fare, but needs must – somewhere in deepest Millwall, and as it was the last bus I had to walk a long way home through very dark streets.

But at least, unlike Iftikhar Hussain, I've never got myself locked in a library. The Mirror reports this morning that the 26-year-old was so absorbed in his book he didn't realise the library was closing, and was trapped for over an hour before he was rescued. The poor man was so upset he suffered a panic attack and had to be taken to hospital.

Not to belittle his ordeal, but if I had to be locked anywhere, I can't help thinking a library wouldn't be too bad (although now I say that, I'm remembering scary flashes of Pennywise the clown appearing in the library in Stephen King's It, so perhaps not). How about you? Ever missed a train/plane/date because you couldn't stop reading? Tell me about the embarrassing situations books have got you into.