The Archers Encyclopaedia by Joanna Toye and Adrian Flynn (BBC, £15.99)

THIS is the one that is beyond any shadow of doubt, most definitely for those fans who clamber over Lakey Hill clad in anoraks.

Compiled by two of the programme's scriptwriters, who have been allowed unparalleled access to the archive entries, they list everything that has ever moved in the everyday story of country-folk... apart from Dame Edna Everage, whose card must have gone missing.

Published to celebrate the 50 glorious years of Ambridge, it's a Mastermind contestant's dream, just so long as their specialised subject is The Archers.

Mr Chapman, your time starts now: Who hit Ricky Boyd with a paperweight in John Tregorran's shop? Tina Paget. Correct. Who escorted Marjorie Antrobus to the Ambridge barn dance in 1987? General Sir Borthwick Hare. Correct. What is the name of the Grey Gables chef? Pass.

It's not the people and places of this guide to the completely fictional that interest me, so much as the list of real people who have got in on the act - Princess Margaret, Gilbert Harding, Humphrey Lyttleton, Anneka Rice, the Duke of Westminster, Brit Eckland, John Peel, Angela Rippon, Richard Todd, Terry Wogan - and the famous actors who have done their stint beside the Am (Dame Judi Dench, Rosemary Leach, Judy Parfitt, Stella Gonet, Arnold Ridley, Donald Houston, Robin Bailey, Angela Thorne...)

Even pre first-time-round Crossroads actors Jane Rossington (Jill) and Paul Henry (Benny) dum-di-dummed.

Then there are the luminaries who have bided their time in minor roles. June Spencer (Peggy Woolley) used to be Emily Spenlowe and Rita Flynn and Mary Benson; Mary Wimbush (Julia Pargetter) was Jane Maxwell, Lady Isabel Lander and Elsie Catcher in previous existances.

And figure this one out: Judy Bennett (Shula Archer - now Hebden-Lloyd) in real life married to Charles Collingwood, who plays Brian Aldridge, has been the voice of her twin brother Kenton, her sister Elizabeth, her cousin Adam Macy and once had a holiday romance with Pedro the Spaniard, played by Norman Painting, her on-air father.

I told you it was for anoraks. Mine's bottle green.

David Chapman