If you examine your life, sometimes you'll find themes that inexplicably repeat themselves without logic. In my life, for example, I have noticed that the five people I regarded as my mentors at different times, were all of age 52 when I met them. Another: four times in my life, I have found myself wholly responsible for single-handedly arranging the funerals of people who I had not known at all while they'd lived.

One of these recurring themes has been a little book about a prince who lived on an asteroid.