When I started Books on the Table last September, it didn’t really occur to me that people I didn’t know would read it. I thought the blog would be a fun creative outlet and a way for me to share my love of books with friends and acquaintances. Obviously, I had a lot to learn. Most of my readers, as far as I can tell, are people I’ve never met. They’ve found the blog through friends of friends, with the help of Google and other search engines, via links on other blogs and social media . . . and because they are fans of Lynda Carter, a.k.a. Wonder Woman.

A little background for those of you who didn’t grow up in the 1970s: Wonder Woman, Amazon warrior princess of comic book fame, was played by Lynda Carter on TV from 1975 through 1979. Lynda also was Miss World USA in 1972 and has had a successful acting and singing career. And it turns out that Lynda is the aunt of Michaela Carter, independent bookstore owner and author of the recently published novel, Further Out Than You Thought.

I thought Further Out Than You Thought was a terrific novel, albeit a little edgier than the fiction I usually read, and posted a positive review on the blog. I received some comments, including a nice message from the author, and moved on to the next review. Then, a few days later, I got a notification from WordPress that there was unusually high activity on my blog. I assumed that the blog was hacked . . . but I soon learned that Wonder Woman was at work. She had shared my review with the hundreds of thousands of people who follow her on Facebook and Twitter: “So proud of my niece, Michaela Carter’s first novel”.  It seems that a lot of Lynda’s fans — including someone from the Lynda Carter Fan Club of Latin America — reposted the review as well. For a couple of days, my blog traffic was 10 times what it usually is.

If anyone had asked me a couple of weeks ago what the most popular posts over the past year have been, I would have said 10 Books to Read This Summer (At the Beach or Not), 10 Books for “Carnivorous” Readers, 10 Gateway Books for Teenagers — you get the idea. People seem to love lists of book recommendations. I never would have imagined that a review of a debut novel would have been my most popular post.

My first year of blogging has been a learning experience, full of surprises. As parents tell their kids, be careful what you post on the Internet. You never know who’s going to see it — maybe even a woman with superpowers. I’m grateful to all the book lovers I’ve had the chance to connect with through Books on the Table. Thank you for reading, commenting, and sharing!