Comcast hostile takeover bid is deja vu for former Disney executive turned author

Waking Walt author Larry Pontius predicted this would happen. Published in December of 2002, his award winning thriller, Waking Walt, poses the same challenge to Disney and offers up a most unexpected savior -- Walt Disney, who supposedly died in 1966

Orlando, FA (PRWEB) February 17, 2004 --In his writers den in Central Florida, Larry Pontius is shaking his head. As a former Disney marketing executive and author of the award winning speculative thriller, Waking Walt, he can't help but smile. After six years writing the book and another three fighting to get it published in the face of agent and publisher concerns over possible Disney legal action, his phone is ringing off the hook. Its the media calling.

Reporters and producers from television stations, cable news networks newspapers, and major business magazines in the US as well as the UK have requested copies of Waking Walt.

Someone jokingly asked me if I was Nostradamus," Pontius said. But I was as surprised as anyone when Comcast announced their takeover bid for Disney. For me, its fiction turning into fact. Of course, Im sure the motives are different from those in my novel. And the ending will have to be, although I wish it didnt."

In Waking Walt, Pontius brings to life one of our most enduring legends: Walt Disney never died, but is somewhere out there in cryonic suspension waiting to come back when his lung cancer can be cured. And as the title suggests, in the Pontius thriller Walt is awakened in a desperate attempt to save his company from a ruthless corporate raider bent on tearing it apart.

In the process of promoting Waking Walt, months before the Comcast situation, Pontius became a contributing columnist on several Disney related Internet sites including the popular Jim Hill Media.com, Mickey News.com and Magical Mountain.net. His column What Would Walt Think?" has often skewered the Disney Company for failings that many analysts are now saying led to the vulnerability which encouraged Comcast to launch its takeover bid.

Interviewed by a reporter from the Orlando ABC Television affiliate, WFTV-TV, Pontius was asked what his primary concern was should Comcast succeed in their bid for Disney. I worry about losing the Disney legacy" Pontius said. The creative excellence and adherence to a set of values that has made Disney the greatest family entertainment company in the world. If Comcast buys Disney and turns it into something else, the world has lost something special. That would be a bad investment."

Waking Walt can be purchased online from Amazon.com, Barnesandnoble.com, Booksamillion.com, and is available at virtually any bookstore.

Contact Information
Larry Pontius
407-831-8664
http://www.wakingwalt.com