{"id":11824,"date":"2018-06-29T08:00:16","date_gmt":"2018-06-29T12:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/?p=11824"},"modified":"2018-06-26T22:43:39","modified_gmt":"2018-06-27T02:43:39","slug":"my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/","title":{"rendered":"My First Fright featuring Jonathan Janz"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"9176\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/first-fright-featuring-kealan-patrick-burke\/firstfright_webbanner\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/FirstFright_WebBanner.jpg?fit=830%2C120&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"830,120\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"firstfright_webbanner\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/FirstFright_WebBanner.jpg?fit=830%2C120&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-9176\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/FirstFright_WebBanner.jpg?resize=830%2C120\" alt=\"\" width=\"830\" height=\"120\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/FirstFright_WebBanner.jpg?w=830&amp;ssl=1 830w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/FirstFright_WebBanner.jpg?resize=350%2C51&amp;ssl=1 350w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/FirstFright_WebBanner.jpg?resize=768%2C111&amp;ssl=1 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_11826\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11826\" style=\"width: 210px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"11826\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/jonathanjanz\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/jonathanjanz.jpg?fit=210%2C200&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"210,200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"jonathanjanz\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"&lt;p&gt;Jonathan Janz&lt;\/p&gt;\n\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/jonathanjanz.jpg?fit=210%2C200&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11826\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/jonathanjanz.jpg?resize=210%2C200\" alt=\"\" width=\"210\" height=\"200\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-11826\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jonathan Janz<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>I lived a good chunk of my childhood on a small, rural road. All of the homes had families and were fairly well-kempt, so my siblings and my best buddy who lived next door didn\u2019t really have a typical \u201chaunted house\u201d to be afraid of; but that didn\u2019t keep us from concocting weird stories about the surrounding property. That creepy orchard up the hill? A kid my mom used to babysit for convinced us that he had seen a <i>severed hand<\/i> from World War II hanging from a tree up there (yep, from that famous WWII battle fought in Upstate New York, of course). Then there was the turnaround where I <i>swear<\/i> I saw a UFO land one night (okay, maybe that was just a dream). When you\u2019re a kid, your imagination runs wild, and seemingly innocuous places can transform into terrifying locales. Jonathan Janz can relate&#8212;he read a story back in seventh grade that touched on just that idea, a story that stuck with him and put him on a path to creating strange stories of his own. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<!--more--><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/jonathanjanz.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Jonathan Janz <\/a>is the author of more than a dozen novels and numerous short stories. His work has been championed by authors like Joe R. Lansdale, Jack Ketchum, and Brian Keene; he has also been lauded by <i>Publishers Weekly<\/i>, the <i>Library Journal<\/i>, and the <i>School Library Journal<\/i>. His novel <i>Children of the Dark<\/i> was chosen by <i>Booklist<\/i> as a \u201cTop Ten Horror Book of the Year.\u201d His latest book, <i>The Siren and the Specter<\/i>, a ghost story set on Virginia\u2019s Rappahannock River, will be released in September by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.flametreepress.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Flame Tree Press<\/a>. His entire backlist will also be available through Flame Tree, and he\u2019s hoping to have two or three new novels coming in 2019.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>(Interview conducted by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/johnbrhel\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">John Brhel<\/a>)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><b>CEMETERY DANCE: What is your \u201cfirst fright\u201d?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">JONATHAN JANZ: August Derleth\u2019s \u201cThe Lonesome Place.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>I\u2019m not familiar with that story. Can you give a short, spoiler-free summary?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"11827\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/lonesomeplaces\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/lonesomeplaces.jpg?fit=411%2C605&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"411,605\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"lonesomeplaces\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/lonesomeplaces.jpg?fit=411%2C605&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-11827\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/lonesomeplaces-238x350.jpg?resize=238%2C350\" alt=\"\" width=\"238\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/lonesomeplaces.jpg?resize=238%2C350&amp;ssl=1 238w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/lonesomeplaces.jpg?w=411&amp;ssl=1 411w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 238px) 85vw, 238px\" \/>It&#8217;s a short story I read in some anthology when I was in seventh grade. I remember being at the library after school and waiting on my grandpa to pick me up. I scanned the titles of books and saw one that looked creepy. I was NOT a reader&#8212;had never read a book at that point, and probably hadn&#8217;t read a story I picked out on my own. I liked the title &#8220;The Lonesome Place,&#8221; so I decided to give it a shot. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The basic plot is a young man in a small town has to pass by this eerie little spot on his way home from school. I believe it&#8217;s a vacant lot near some abandoned building. But it&#8217;s shadowy, and it fills him with dread. He does everything he can to avoid it, but the geography of his little town makes it almost impossible to avoid. He thinks of excuses when his mom asks for items from the store, but to his chagrin, she always seems to ask for these items around dinner time. So, he has to pass by the lonesome place twice as the dusk deepens. He imagines that he sees and hears things as he runs by the place. I believe he and his friends have even heard stories about it. But his imagination absolutely goes haywire every time he ventures near the spot. Not to give the story away, but ultimately, he learns that there might something very real lurking there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>That sounds like a perfect story for a seventh grader, because that seems like the type of stuff you do around that age, make stories out of strange places.<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes. It was. Making it even more perfect was the type of day it was. Very rainy, very dark. I was the only kid in the library, and I think my grandpa was late that day (he rarely was). The feeling the story gave me was half-terrifying, half-delicious. I reveled in my discomfort, but I also hated it. I kept whirling and checking behind me, sure that something&#8212;the something from \u201cThe Lonesome Place\u201d&#8212;was creeping up behind me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Did you take the book home?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know&#8230;I think I might have. I definitely remember going back through the story and lingering on the scariest parts. Those might have been my first nascent moments as a storyteller (on the page); prior to that, I had always wanted to make movies and tell scary stories through a visual medium. But what stunned me was that although the tale was just comprised of words, it WAS a visual medium. I saw it all so vividly. I experienced it like I would have experienced a movie, only this was much more personal and almost unsettlingly intimate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, I think in this case it was that the love of all things macabre was always just &#8220;in&#8221; me. I think back to early childhood, and one of the tales I remember vividly is &#8220;Shivers&#8221; from the Arnold Lobel <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Frog and Toad<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> series. There were about twenty of those stories, all of them fantastic, but it was the scariest one that really stuck with me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"11828\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/frogandtoad\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/FrogandToad.jpg?fit=637%2C364&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"637,364\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"FrogandToad\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/FrogandToad.jpg?fit=637%2C364&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11828\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/FrogandToad.jpg?resize=637%2C364\" alt=\"\" width=\"637\" height=\"364\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/FrogandToad.jpg?w=637&amp;ssl=1 637w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/FrogandToad.jpg?resize=350%2C200&amp;ssl=1 350w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Later on, my mom&#8212;whom I suspect is one of the primary culprits here&#8212;would watch shows like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Twilight Zone<\/span><\/i> <i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and In Search Of\u2026,<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and these shows also spoke to me in a way other genres didn&#8217;t. I&#8217;ve always loved all types of stories&#8212;funny, adventurous, sweet, action-packed, moving&#8212;but for some reason, the scary ones reached down inside me and stirred me in a way the others couldn&#8217;t replicate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A few other examples of these early chills were recordings of Poe\u2019s \u201cThe Tell-Tale Heart\u201d and Charles Dickens\u2019 \u201cThe Signal-Man,\u201d as well as a marionette performance of Washington Irving\u2019s \u201cThe Legend of Sleepy Hollow.\u201d These stories were wildly disturbing yet paradoxically comforting. I guess knowing that others were fascinated by scary things validated my own ubiquitous fears. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>As someone who has now written numerous stories of that ilk, do you find &#8220;The Lonesome Place&#8221; compelling years later? Does it hold up? Is it still &#8220;scary&#8221;?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Great question. I haven&#8217;t looked at that tale for maybe six or seven years, but when I did revisit it, I remember enjoying it again and understanding why it impacted me. I think it does hold up, although objectively most horror writers would consider it a little too straightforward to be deemed a classic. But because I was inexperienced and quite susceptible to the story&#8217;s spell at that age, it really walloped me. So yes, it holds up, but I can clearly see the man above the stage pulling the strings to create the desired effect.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Would you say that the way Derleth told the story influenced your own writing in any way? Have you gone on to use any of the techniques employed in &#8220;The Lonesome Place&#8221; in your own stories? <\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"11830\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/nightshift4\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/NightShift4.jpg?fit=250%2C424&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"250,424\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"NightShift4\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/NightShift4.jpg?fit=250%2C424&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-11830\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/NightShift4.jpg?resize=250%2C424\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"424\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/NightShift4.jpg?w=250&amp;ssl=1 250w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/NightShift4.jpg?resize=206%2C350&amp;ssl=1 206w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 250px) 85vw, 250px\" \/>Absolutely. I think that formative moment still echoes in some of my shorter fiction. Obviously, there are all kinds of short stories, but one type I always love (when done well) is the kind with a real payoff or a shattering ending. Sometimes it&#8217;s a twist, sometimes it&#8217;s what the reader expects but dreads. The seed that Derleth planted, I suspect, led me to appreciate many of the tales in King&#8217;s <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Night Shift<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, the best tales of Richard Matheson, and the short stories of Roald Dahl. And the doozy of an ending featured in &#8220;The Lonesome Place&#8221; probably impacted my stuff too. &#8220;The Clearing of Travis Coble&#8221; and &#8220;Old Order,&#8221; for instance, feature awfully dark and twisty (and twisted) endings.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>You\u2019re a man after my own heart. I love <\/b><b><i>Night Shift<\/i><\/b><b>, and Matheson and Dahl are some of my favorite short story writers. <\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They&#8217;re amazing, aren&#8217;t they? Stories like &#8220;Strawberry Spring&#8221; and &#8220;I Am the Doorway&#8221; still blow my doors off. So do Matheson&#8217;s &#8220;Button, Button,&#8221; &#8220;Prey,&#8221; and &#8220;Nightmare at 20,000 Feet,&#8221; as do Dahl&#8217;s &#8220;Lamb to the Slaughter,&#8221; &#8220;Man from the South,&#8221; and so many others.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Did you go on to read any more Derleth?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think I&#8217;ve read a few more Derleth tales, and while he&#8217;s not my absolute favorite, it seems like there were a couple others I enjoyed. Something about a red-haired child maybe? I&#8217;ll have to go look through his titles&#8230;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Do you have any memories of scary places in your own hometown that remind you of the mill in &#8220;The Lonesome Place&#8221;? Did you envision any similar place when you read the story?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oh, my goodness, yes. This is probably why I was so affected by the tale. I grew up on the edge of town, sort of in the country, with my mom and my cat. We had a tiny house next to a graveyard. Behind us was a deep, dark woods. On the other side was an insane woman whose husband shot himself when, I believe, I was home (though I don&#8217;t remember hearing the gunshot). I was ALWAYS afraid when I was little, and the lonesome places surrounding me had a lot to do with that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"11831\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/children\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/children.jpg?fit=313%2C500&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"313,500\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"children\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/children.jpg?fit=313%2C500&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-11831\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/children-219x350.jpg?resize=219%2C350\" alt=\"\" width=\"219\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/children.jpg?resize=219%2C350&amp;ssl=1 219w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/children.jpg?w=313&amp;ssl=1 313w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 219px) 85vw, 219px\" \/>Geez. You sure you&#8217;re not a protagonist in some horror movie?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hah! No, but Will Burgess, the protagonist from my <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Children of the Dark<\/span><\/i> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">novels, is basically me. His house, his personality, just about all of it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Do you have anything else you&#8217;d like to add about \u201cThe Lonesome Place\u201d or how it impacted you?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I&#8217;d say that it opened my eyes to what written fiction could accomplish. I didn&#8217;t read my first novel until the summer between eighth grade and my freshman year, but when I did it was <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Tommyknockers<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> by Stephen King. But without &#8220;The Lonesome Place,&#8221; I likely never would have picked up that novel (and it was that novel that made me a reader, a horror writer, and an English teacher).<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I lived a good chunk of my childhood on a small, rural road. All of the homes had families and were fairly well-kempt, so my siblings and my best buddy who lived next door didn\u2019t really have a typical \u201chaunted house\u201d to be afraid of; but that didn\u2019t keep us from concocting weird stories about &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/my-first-fright-featuring-jonathan-janz\/\" class=\"more-link button bg-gold white\">Continue Reading!<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;My First Fright featuring Jonathan Janz&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[979],"tags":[294,803,640,980],"class_list":["post-11824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-my-first-fright","tag-columns","tag-john-brhel","tag-jonathan-janz","tag-my-first-fright"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO 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