IMAGINE if someone told you he could prove, beyond any doubt, that there was life after death.

Well, that's what Stephen Holbrook does. He describes himself at a telephone exchange between this world and the next," passing on messages to an audience from loved ones who have died.

He bills himself as being the most consistently accurate medium working today.

So, what do the dead have to say for themselves?

The other day I was doing a meeting in Portsmouth, and a message came through from a woman for a lady there, and she said to tell her about the blue socks, said Holbrook.

Well, this lady jumped up and was shouting that she had her mother's blue socks in her handbag right there.

Not quite the mystery of the ages, but Holbrook says he can only pass on the messages he receives. And, after all, it is these tiny personal details that Holbrook says convince people he's genuine and that there is something after death.

He says that more often than not this news brings people comfort.

Convinced? Well West Yorkshire seem to have faith in him after asking him to help out with inquiries following a recent murder.

I was holding the victim's clothes and talking to the family and there were some quite startling revelations," said Holbrook.

Demand seems to be something that causes Holbrook the most trouble.

He is currently performing shows, such as the one at the Bank House Hotel, Bransford, tomorrow, almost every night and is under pressure to do TV.

The BBC has been pestering the life out of me to do my own show on mainstream TV," he said.

And not just the BBC, but Channel 4. They want the show because of the raw emotions involved.

But Holbrook knows all too well the price of fame. With the help of a well-informed spirit, he predicted singer Jane McDonald's rise to fame through fly-on-the-wall documentary The Cruise.

I'm best friends with Jane McDonald and I've seen what fame has done to her. We can't go shopping without her having to stop and sign 50 autographs.

"I've got three kids under nine years old and I wouldn't want to put them through it. They're already coming home and telling me the other kids at school are calling me 'the spooky man'."

Holbrook says what he does is completely natural and he has absolute confidence when he walks on stage his gift will not fail him.

That doesn't stop him feeling nervous.

I'm always nervous. You should see my fingernails," he said.

It all started for Holbrook when he was 14. It was 4am when he was woken by his grandfather who said he had come to say goodbye.

The youngster was sent back to bed by his mum, putting it all down to a dream. Until the hospital phoned the next day with the news that his grandfather had died at 4am.

Holbrook began to hear voices in his head and the story goes that at 16 he went to see a doctor, who advised him to go to a spiritualist church.

It was there that Holbrook found some answers and began to develop his gift.

Years passed until, eventually, he left his life as a hairdresser in Leeds and took to the road with his "meetings.