Need to know: The evidence - The agony aunt's handbag

Sophie Parkin is an agony aunt for eight to 14 year-olds on the AOL Internet Kids Channel. She is also a writer, her second novel, Take Me Home, is published by Headline on 8 April

"I always carry lots of books with me. I'm currently carrying a copy of my new book (1) to remind myself what it's about as I'm now working on something else. A friend gave me the book The Vagina Monologues (2) last night and I also have a magazine (3) which I had a story in. I was at a reading last night given by a poet/philosopher type. He has been writing one of these little leaflets (4) every day for four years. I guess it's a form of absurdist humour - it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Someone gave me a condom (5) with a photo of Marc Almond on the wrapper. I was at college with him so they gave it to me to give to him. It does remind me of the shocking amount of very young pregnant teenagers I have to give advice to. I usually carry around ten different shades of lipstick (6) and lots of pens. I also have a nice Mont Blanc (7) which was given to me by an ex-boyfriend. He said it was to improve my handwriting so he promptly became an ex! This is my favourite bag (8), I bought it for myself, it's great for cycling but people do tend to confuse you with the postman."

Photograph by Claudia Janke