Just finished reading a book by Tom Hanks (the actor), called "Uncommon Types: Some Stories". I really enjoyed it a great deal. It is a collection of unrelated short stories, although some of them do reuse the names of characters, although characters from different stories with the same names appear to be unrelated to each other.

In an NPR interview about the book, when asked when hsi next book will come out, Tom Hanks said that it was written over a period of more than 16 years. If he were to put out another in just 6-12 months it just would not be as good and he would not be happy with it, and readers would be cheated. I am paraphrasing, but that was the general gist of what he said.