In a rare and special episode of Sonitotum, I look back and forward as I observe the fifteenth anniversary of my first podcast episode.

This one's for my mother.

Fred Rogers inspired this eighth episode of Sonitotum with Matthew Wayne Selznick, which is an optimistic and positive exploration of your creative legacy. You might already have one! Listen to learn why.

How and why each novel or short story can serve to lead readers to the rest of your work.

Ray Bradbury was a more profound influence in my life than either of the men I could call "father." Today, after more than ninety one years on the planet (seventy eight of them spent at the age of thirteen), my story-father has died.

When I was a kid in the seventies and eighties, I loved comics. For a while there, I was buying three dozen books every two weeks. Many of them were Marvel comics, and of those, many of those Marvel comics were written by Bill Mantlo. It's not an exaggeration to say I've read hundreds of comicbooks Bill Mantlo wrote, including forever favorites like The Spectacular Spider-Man, ROM Spaceknight, and, head and shoulders above all else, Micronauts. In fact, Micronauts changed my life by introducing me to concepts like quantum physics and the physiological origins of consciousness. Today I learned that Bill Mantlo has been physically and cognitively crippled with brain damage since being run over by a hit-and-run driver almost twenty years ago. He can barely talk, or use his hands. His short term memory is nearly non-existent. In other words, the man whose stories inspired me and challenged me, and in no small way led me to tell my own... is silenced. It breaks my heart. And it makes me angry. Read the article in LifeHealthPro and learn how CIGNA in particular and the state of health care in the United States in general has made Bill Mantlo's quality…

Thinking about the demise of Borders book stores and what might arise in their absence.