Joe Moran is Professor of English and Cultural History at Liverpool John Moores University and is the author of seven books, including Shrinking Violets: The Secret Life of Shyness, First You Write a Sentence and If You Should Fail. He writes for, among others, the Guardian, the New Statesman and the Times Literary Supplement.

'Habit and routine make us blind to the everyday familiar but Joe Moran reveals that the people we rarely notice in railway stations, parks, restaurants, and on city streets, are all uniquely mysterious and unknowable, as indeed are the people we think we know well. A salutary and eloquent reminder that the mundane is in fact the exotic. Thoroughly enjoyable.'

Joe Moran is Professor of English and Cultural History at Liverpool John Moores University and is the author of seven books, including Shrinking Violets: The Secret Life of Shyness, First You Write a Sentence and If You Should Fail. He writes for, among others, the Guardian, the New Statesman and the Times Literary Supplement.

'Habit and routine make us blind to the everyday familiar but Joe Moran reveals that the people we rarely notice in railway stations, parks, restaurants, and on city streets, are all uniquely mysterious and unknowable, as indeed are the people we think we know well. A salutary and eloquent reminder that the mundane is in fact the exotic. Thoroughly enjoyable.'

Joe Moran is Professor of English and Cultural History at Liverpool John Moores University and is the author of seven books, including Shrinking Violets: The Secret Life of Shyness, First You Write a Sentence and If You Should Fail. He writes for, among others, the Guardian, the New Statesman and the Times Literary Supplement.

'Habit and routine make us blind to the everyday familiar but Joe Moran reveals that the people we rarely notice in railway stations, parks, restaurants, and on city streets, are all uniquely mysterious and unknowable, as indeed are the people we think we know well. A salutary and eloquent reminder that the mundane is in fact the exotic. Thoroughly enjoyable.'