Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives message of the book is the importance of exploring new ideas beyond the ones that have been traditionally passed down. The title word "Sum" refers to the Latin for "I am," as in "Cogito ergo sum". Like Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities", "Sum" does not fit entirely into the traditional category of a novel. "Sum" has been called "philosofiction", an "experimental novel", and "a collection of thought experiments". Most of the stories are understood to "posit the afterlife as mirroring life on Earth" The New York Times Book Review called Sum a "delightful, thought-provoking little collection [which] belongs to that category
Mr. Cogito book, invites a range of various interpretations, including cultural and historical ones. True to the Cartesian overtones of his name, Mr. Cogito often reflects on life and the world, providing the reader with the thoughtful statements. Coming from an Everyman, they attain a range of universal meanings. The first poem in the collection is entitled "Pan Cogito obserwuje w lustrze swoją twarz" ("Mr Cogito Looks At His Face In A Mirror"). A poem about aging, it poses questions about the limits of individual freedom. The second, "O dwu nogach Pana Cogito" ("On Mr. Cogito's Two Legs") concerns the duality of