The Red Notebook
The Red Notebook is a story-in-a-story collection by Paul Auster. The book consists of four parts, all stories which had appeared previously: The Red Notebook (1995), Why Write? (1996), Accident Report (1999) and It Don't Mean a Thing (2000). They are true stories gathered from Auster's life as well as the lives of his friends and acquaintances and they have all one thing in common: the paradox of coincidence. Auster narrates things he writes about in his fiction, making one wonder if he's really telling the truth.[original research?] Implying that everything and everyone is somehow, mysteriously, connected to each other.[original research?]
Auster tells about the wrong number that inspired him to write City of Glass, about how he met his childhood hero Willie Mays, but didn't have a pencil with him to get his autograph and how during all four flat tires of his life he had the same passenger in the car with him.