The Stone Child

Dan Poblocki's debut novel, The Stone Child, a young adult fantasy/horror novel, follows main character Eddie Fennicks, an adolescent obsessed with the horror and mystery novels of his favorite writer, Nathaniel Olmstead. The novel begins when Eddie moves with his mother and father to Gatesweed, Massachusetts, and Eddie discovers that Olmstead used to live there—not only that but Olmstead was inspired by the town, setting many of his books in a fictional version of it. Chaos comes when Eddie tries to solve the mystery of Olmstead's disappearance thirteen years before, uncovering the presence of horrific, fictional creatures come to life to haunt Gatesweed.

Eddie Fennicks isn't thrilled at first when his parents announce their move to the small town of Gatesweed, Massachusetts. However, his perspective shifts when he discovers that the object of his one obsession, the author Nathaniel Olmstead, used to live there. Eddie loves Olmstead's horror novels, all of which have an element of mystery. When he and his parents move to town, Eddie finds Olmstead's old house, which has fallen into disrepair—the author disappeared thirteen years ago under mysterious circumstances and hasn't been seen since.

At school, Eddie makes two friends, Harris and Maggie, who share his passion for Olmstead and for solving mysteries. Harris and Maggie, as well as other people in town, share stories about the Olmstead curse, which they claim haunts Gatesweed. Eddie is curious but skeptical of their claims.



Soon after their arrival, Eddie's mother, who is working on her own horror novel, finds an unpublished Olmstead manuscript at an antique store. She buys it for Eddie and gives it to him; the book is called The Enigmatic Manuscript and is written in a code that Eddie can't understand. Curious about the book, he wonders if it might help find Olmstead. He, Harris, and Maggie begin to read the book, attempting to decode it, and searching for clues about Olmstead's disappearance.

As the children begin their decoding and investigation, strange things start to appear in Olmstead. Eddie and his friends visit Olmstead's decrepit home and other sites from his books, and as they do, the monsters from his books come to life. Soon the kids are forced to do battle with monstrous lake-dogs and gremlins. This, they realize, is part of the Olmstead curse and linked to Olmstead's own disappearance—if they can crack the code and find Olmstead, the monsters will return to the realm of fiction, and the Olmstead curse will be broken.

As if monsters and coded manuscripts weren't enough for Eddie, Harris, and Maggie to deal with, Eddie begins to suspect that the horror novel his mother is writing may also be subject to the Olmstead curse. The kids begin a race against the clock to find Olmstead and break the curse before the monster in Eddie's mother's novel comes to life—a creature more terrifying than any of Olmstead's imaginings.



The children move from local Gatesweed to Dracula's Romania to the Garden of Eden to solve Olmstead's final mystery—and in so doing, their lives are put on the line.

Dan Poblocki is the author of many books of horror and paranormal fantasy for young people. He has written The Shadow House series, The Nightmarys, The Stone Child, and other novels. He was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and raised in New Jersey. After a brief acting career in local theatre, he began to work odd jobs in New York City, including work as a floral groomer, chemotherapy unit nursing aid, computer analyst, and game show audience wrangler. He is now a full-time writer living in Kingston, New York with his two cats. His books have been translated into Polish, Greek, and French.