Vic Reeves's vivid, enchanting, and utterly hilarious childhood memoir is a comic masterpiece and a stunning melange of whimsical reminiscences and imaginative reconstruction.

Before there was Vic Reeves, there was a boy called James Moir, who was much the same as any other young lad. Obsessed with owning a pet crow, a master at writing his name and terrified of his father's immense moustaches, Jim begins his journey to adulthood in Yorkshire before being deposited in County Durham with an accent that not even the headmaster can avoid laughing at.

Whether trying to escape the attentions of the infamous "Randy Mandy", or getting a crash course in the tricky art of pig castration, the adolescent tribulations of the boy who would be Reeves are at once instantly familiar and compellingly strange. Well, do you know anyone else who counts chance encounters with both Jimi Hendrix and the Yorkshire Ripper among their personal rites of passage?

Peopled with a wonderful collection of warm, wicked and weird characters, Vic Reeves's memoir is as unique as you'd expect from one of Britain's most exceptional comedy talents.

First released: Thursday 8th June 2006