David Gutierrez is the co-founder of Non-Fungible Book Club (NFBC), an independent audiobook platform focused on helping authors retain greater ownership, control, and revenue from their work. Built around a creator-first philosophy, NFBC was founded on the belief that writers deserve a more meaningful relationship with both their audience and the success of their art.

David is also the author of Punkz Awaken: Disconnecting the Minted, a young adult science fiction novella that blends action, rebellion, and retro-futuristic themes inspired by 90s internet culture. Filled with callbacks to the era of 56k dial-up modems, underground digital culture, and analog nostalgia, the story follows a young protagonist who grows disillusioned with the pressures and inequities of the adult world and ultimately joins a rebellion searching for something more human, authentic, and free.

David's experience as an independent author helped inspire his passion for supporting creators and building better opportunities for writers within the audiobook industry.

Today, through NFBC, David and his team work with independent authors and publishers to help bring audiobooks directly to audiences while allowing creators to keep significantly more of their earnings than traditional industry models typically allow. NFBC's mission centers on empowering authors, preserving creative independence, and building deeper communities around books and storytelling.

Instagram: @NFBCSocials (https://www.instagram.com/nfbcsocials/)

YouTube: @NFBCSocials (https://www.youtube.com/@NFBCSocials)

X: @NFBCSocials (https://x.com/NFBCSocials)

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-gutierrez-507340276/

Website: www.nfbclub.com

Prolific Writers Life

Punkz Awaken: Disconnecting the Minted, 4th ed., David Gutierrez

Story-Power Guest Episode 80 8/2/23 Cheryl King, Sitting on Top of the World, and Under the Paw Paw Trees

Edgar Allan Poe Greatest Works

Shut Up and Write Global Community

Story-Power Guest Episode 140 11/19/25 Guy Morris, Swarm, The Last Ark, The Image

Story-Power Guest Episode 24 "Every Life is a Library"

PodMatch for Podcasters

Story-Power Guest Episode 41 2/2/22 Ali Khamseh

Story-Power Guest Episode 42 2/16/22 Lola Drona

Classic Cinema With the Sage Sisters YouTube channel

Films for Writers on Prolific Writers Life

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (1979) (1989) (2005), Book by C. S. Lewis

Hello Story-Power listeners. I wanted to let you know that after several years of producing Story-Power, I've started running ads through Libsyn to support the show. These are programmatic ads, in other words I don't pick each brand, but I have blocked categories that don't align with my values. Your support of this show over the years has meant a lot to me. Running these ads will help me pay for producing all the great content I've been providing. I plan to contiue to bring you stories of innovative creators that will hopefully inspire you. Thanks so much for following Story-Power.

Fran Hawthorne has been writing novels since she was four years old, although she was sidetracked for several decades by journalism. During that award-winning career, she wrote eight nonfiction books, mainly about consumer activism, the drug industry, and the financial world, and was also an editor or regular contributor for The New York Times, Business Week, Fortune, and many other publications.

But Fran never abandoned her true love: Her first two novels, The Heirs and I Meant to Tell You, were published in 2018 and 2022 and together won or were named a finalist for nine awards, including the Eric Hoffer Book Awards and the Sarton Award. HER DAUGHTER, Fran's third novel, has just been published by Black Rose Writing.

Website, Instagram

Hello Story-Power listeners. I wanted to let you know that after several years of producing Story-Power, I've started running ads through Libsyn to support the show. These are programmatic ads, in other words I don't pick each brand, but I have blocked categories that don't align with my values. Your support of this show over the years has meant a lot to me. Running these ads will help me pay for producing all the great content I've been providing. I plan to continue to bring you stories of innovative creators that will hopefully inspire you. Thanks so much for followiing Story-Power.

I've been producing Story-Power for six years now and have dedided to include ads with the episodes to offset the costs of producing the content you've been consuming. I appeciate each of you who listen. I hope you will continue to enjoy the stories of my fabulous guests.

Over the years, I've used comedy, music, and film as ways to process life and connect with people in a real, unpolished way. My latest project, The Loneliest Boy on Earth, came out of that impulse — it's part experiment, part personal confession, and part attempt to make sense of love and identity in the modern world. What I've learned is that vulnerability, when shared honestly, can be both healing and entertaining (also provocative and dangerous) — and that's the kind of conversation I want to bring to your audience.

Across all mediums — whether film, music, or live conversation — my work is about pushing boundaries, experimenting with form, and ultimately creating something that is both meaningful and entertaining.

My most recent project, The Loneliest Boy on Earth, is a hybrid of documentary and narrative filmmaking that examines relationships, identity, and self-transformation in a deeply personal way. Right now, I am most interested in discussing this project; but am open to discussing art, creativity, philosophy, and other related topics.

YouTube Channel

Instagram

TikTok

(X)

Hello Story-Power listeners. I wanted to let you know that after several years of producing Story-Power, I've started running ads through Libsyn to support the show. these are programmatic ads, in other words I don't pick each brand, but I have blocked catefories that don't align with my values. Your support of this show over the years has meant a lot to me. Running these ads will help me pay for producing all the great content I've been providing. I plan to continue to bring you stories of innovative creators that will helpfully inspire you. Thanks so much for following Story-Power.

Christine grew up in North Andover, MA with her parents Tony and Joyce and brothers Anthony and Eddie. She was very shy when she was young and spent a lot of time reading. Throughout her childhood Christine loved animals, especially elephants. People started to buy them for her as a collection. Her grandparents, Eddie and Ginger, as well as her parents would bring her back lucky elephants from their trips. Throughout her childhood Christine always enjoyed trips to the beach with her family and grandparents.

In 2006 Christine graduated from Merrimack College with a bachelor's degree in English and a minor in Elementary Education. In 2008 she received her master's degree in Elementary Education from Merrimack College. Christine would then go on to teach elementary school for the next 13 years. Her favorite part of the day was reading to her students. It was during reading time that she connected with her students through books. They learned, laughed and felt a range of emotions together. Christine decided that she wanted to write her own book for students to engage with, while learning and laughing. Since elephants have always been her favorite animal, she found it fitting to include them in her story. In 2017 Christine traveled to Africa with her mother and husband where she was able to see elephants living in the wild, which was always a lifelong dream. Many of the elephants were playing in the water and seemed to be having fun as they appear to in her book. Christine and her husband John have 3 children- Joey, Nick and Adeline and a dog named Sophie with whom she loves to read. They laugh at her stories and enjoy trips to the beach together as a family.

Elephant Beach is her first published work.

Instagram - stined13, Website- Elephant Beach | Christine Devane

Lola & Sophie: ABC Adventures

Pet Safety with Lola & Sophie

Book an Author

I don't remember much about the education policies at the time I was at school. I do remember the classes and teachers that got me excited about learning, and those that created an environment for me to grow, thrive and be me.

This is so key. If this feeling could encompass a whole school you know great things would be possible for everyone involved. It is down to each of us to be that person - to show how and what is possible to those around us and to be a beacon for growth. This helps pupils, staff and parents believe anything is possible. The world is a wonderful place of opportunity so let's make it our focus to 'be the change we wish to see in the world', to quote Gandhi.

It is this bed of creativity that will give rise to the skills, understanding and knowledge that we will need in the future for a sustainable, happy and tolerant planet. Let's show our pupils what has been achieved, what is known and how this came about. Then set them free to explore, enquire and grow so they can become the person they were born to be. In that gift the world has a bright, happy and exciting future of wondrous possibilities.

Mark has been a professional percussionist for 25 years and has had the opportunity of performing with some the UK's finest orchestras and theatre companies. With 3 children and his experience of delivering whole class music workshops around the UK, Mark wanted to share the creative and inspiring learning he was witnessing in schools. This was the start of the Education on Fire podcast in 2016. Today the show has released over 350 episodes and has been downloaded in 147 countries.

Website, Facebook, (X), LinkedIn, Podcast, Education on Fire

Classic Cinema With the Sage Sisters

Through a Different Lens: Lessons from a Life in Education, Ger Graus

Neil Laird is an LGBTQ+, multiple Emmy and BAFTA nominated Executive Producer who has worked extensively on both the network and production side of non-fiction TV since 1997. I've developed, overseen and produced over 1,000 hours of factual programs and specials in nearly every genre, with a particular passion, expertise and professional contacts in history, mystery, science and adventure.

As a showrunner/producer for several highly-respected production companies in the US and UK, I traveled to over 70 countries, with a specialty in history programming in often difficult terrains. My shows have aired on Discovery, Science Channel, Netflix, HBO Max, A&E, History, PBS, BBC, Channel 4, Animal Planet and National Geographic Channel, where I helped launch several successful series, including Brain Games and Border Wars.

Over the years, I've built an extensive list of contacts across the globe in both the production world and with foreign organizations, including antiquities boards in the Middle East, Asia and the Americas, I am a member of scientific institutions such as the Archeological Institute of America and the Explorers Club, and write book reviews for World History Encyclopedia.

I published my first novel Prime Time Travelers in May 2024, with the follow-up, Prime Time Pompeii, following later in the year. Both are inspired by my years in the field making antiquity TV shows.

Website , Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, IMDb

Judith Starkston, Author, Story-Power Episode 114 aired 11/20/24

Gobeli Tepe, Turkey

Pompeii, UNESCO World Heritage site preserved Ancient Roman City

Troy, Ancient Ruins in Turkey (2004) Achilles, Briseis, and Patroclus

Lilith: A Novel Niki Marmery

Julia Felix (Praedia luliae Felicis), Wealthy businesswoman in Pompeii

Luxor, Thebes, Diro Medina, Saqqara Egyptian cities Saqqara where King Tut's Tomb was discovered is a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) First Indiana Jones Movie

Star Trek, Doctor Who

The Space BetweenTime, author, Lucinda Sage-Midgorden

Barry Maughan, Author, Story-Power Episode 146, 2/11/26

The Bright Ages: A New History of Medieval Europe, Matthew Gabriele

Omm Sety (Dorothy Eady 1904 - 1981) Lived and worked in Abydos, Egypt

Ethiopia Jewish Community claimed to be the home of The Ark of the Covenant

The Odyssey, Homer

The Song of Achilles: A Novel, Madeline Miller

Circe, Madeline Miller

Peter O'Toole, British Actor played Priam in (2004) version of Troy

Disaster Movies of the 1970s, The Poseidon Adventure, Airport, Airplane (1980)

"Some places stay with you, not because you lived there long, but because something in you recognized them. I've always felt that landscapes hold memory, something older, deeper. That's the terrain I keep returning to."

I've moved across continents, carried languages, left and found homes again. Through all of it, I've learned that connection to place isn't about PERMANENCE, it's about RESONANCE. I'd love to share a conversation about what it means to feel rooted even when life moves you, how landscapes can reflect back who we are becoming, and how memory, belonging, and identity live in the spaces between.

There's this stretch of coastline in Parksville, not particularly grand or dramatic. It's quiet, mostly. The tide comes and goes without fuss. Driftwood rests where it lands. The sand holds the marks of birds, dogs, children. I walked there often, never with a plan. Just walking.

At first, I didn't think much of it. I was new to the area, still feeling like a visitor in my own life. I didn't speak the landscape's language yet. But little by little, I started noticing things. A crooked branch that looked like it was waving. A stone that never moved. Light that changed the shape of everything.

And then one day, I realized, without meaning to, that I had started to memorize the land. Like it was starting to memorize me back. I knew where the shadows would fall. I knew when the birds would come. I knew how the wind sounded just before it rained.

That was the moment I realized I was building a kind of home with familiarity, with presence, with noticing. I wasn't looking for roots. But they found me anyway.

It made me think of all the places I've been, all the ways I've tried to belong. Sometimes it's hard to say where "home" really is. But for me, it often begins with land, with walking, listening, paying attention.

I didn't know I was gathering home. But I was.

Website, Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram

Federation of Canadian Artists

Art Vancouver, Vancouver Art Foundation at the end of May 2026