A few years ago I found a gem of a book which took me on a trip back to my own journey of what it was like to be a film fan. A journey that was we get a little older, we sometimes forget the pure joy of being a fan of a series of films or even of film in general as we venture into film budgets, social media accounts and how much film a movie makes on its opening weekend. We can sometimes forget what it feels like to be just sit in a dark theatre and prepare for a story to unfold in front of our tears and eyes. That book was Catching Bullets:Memoirs of a Bond Fan and told the story of author Mark O Connelll’s love of the James Bond franchise. If you havent read that took then do check it out such a great read.

Now Mark is back another book which at the moment I have read but its on my list to pick up very soon. I wasnt even aware of the book until I wandered into Marks website to see what he had been up to since his last book.  So what has Mark been up to, well carry on reading.  I found that Mark O’Connell didn’t want to be Luke Skywalker, He actually wanted to be one of the mop-haired kids on the Star Wars toy commercials that took over our screens in the 70s and early 80s, and according to Mark he would have done it had his parents had better pine furniture and a condo in California.

The films Star Wars, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, Raiders of the Lost Ark and Superman didn’t just change cinema – they made lasting highways into our childhoods, toy boxes and video stores like never before. My childhood, Marks childhood and millions of other childhoods around the planet and in his new book Watching Skies. mark promises to take us on a journey through that shared universe of bedroom remakes of Return of the Jedi, close encounters with Christopher Reeve, sticker album swaps, the trauma of losing an entire Star Wars figure collection and honeymooning on Amity Island.

The book is available now  from Amazon right here!