Coincidents in reading

Have you ever noticed that when you read or become aware of a new word in one book, suddenly that word pops up everywhere you read? Or sometimes that happens with an event. This month, I was reading the Odysseus, the Wanderer, a retelling of the Odyssey, which naturally included many references to the Greek gods and the stories of how they originated. I was also reading Anya’s War, set in 1938 Shanghai. The main character was a young Jewish girl who was immersed in Greek mythology by her mother, so many of the incidents in this book were related to what happened to the Greek Gods. I found myself thinking: didn’t I just read about this? And then remember that I had just read a very similar story in Odysseus. Just reinforces the importance of background knowledge and how we learn/remember more if we have a hook to attach new learning to.