The great thing about the bookish blogosphere is all the recommendations that you get from other bloggers and Paul Auster is one of the writers that I’ve really enjoyed reading this year. Most of the books that I read have been written years ago, I think my theory is that if they are still in print after a long time then it’s a fair bet that they’re going to be worthwhile reading.

I’ve read three books by Auster and they’ve all been quite different but what I really like is that you never know where he’s going to go next. Reading him is like having my favourite sort of conversation, the kind that starts off with something mundane like a comment on the weather but within 10 minutes I and a friend have covered topics such as Lord Byron, English architecture, Balmoral, the racing driver Juan Fangio and then end up by setting the world to rights!

With Paul Auster he mentions in passing people like Hedy Lamarr and Edward G. Robinson – and I just thought – “How did he know?” Because as a youngster I watched a lot of old American movies, my dad was a big fan, we watched them on tv but he had seen them all in the cinema when they were first released decades before.

So at the age of about 10 if someone asked me who my favourite film stars were – my answer was always Hedy Lamarr and Edward G. Robinson! I can understand the Hedy bit now because she was so glamorous and I wanted to look like her when I grew up. Tragic really because it was never going to happen. She had gorgeous dark hair and mine is red or strawberry blonde as my mum always said. When I got my waist length hair cut for the first time I told the hairdresser that I wanted it cut like Hedy Lamarr’s. She didn’t know who I was talking about. Everybody else wanted a Purdy cut or Farrah Fawcett-Major!

Don’t ask me why I was into Edward G. Robinson, I look at him now and think that I must have been a very strange 10 year old. Happily by the time I hit 12 I was a fan of Cary Grant, Gregory Peck and of course Humphrey Bogart. If I’m honest I still have a wee soft spot for Edward G. though.

Anyway, back to Paul Auster’s writing: For some reason the fact that he mentioned those two almost forgotten movie stars really made me feel quite chuffed. It’s nice to feel that you have a sort of connection with a writer. And all that came about because one night when I was wandering around some book blogs I came across a comment from Judith (Reader in the Wilderness) which led me to visit her blog.

It’s serendipity.