Local author features towpath, national park as backdrop for novel
by Emily Canning-Dean
Growing up in Akron, Broadview Heights resident Jonathan Walter has many memories of The Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath Trail and Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Including these northeast Ohio gems in his newly released time travel suspense thriller, The Towpath, seemed like the perfect fit.
“I have fond memories riding on the trail as a teenager,” said Walter whose novel was released Nov. 1. “There are certain elements in the book where I had to move things around geographically to make the plot make sense. At the end of the book, I write directly to the residents of Northeast Ohio, explaining how I wanted to pay homage to the beauty of our green spaces and a bit of an apology that I had to change things up a bit.”
The protagonist of the novel is teenager Aaron Porter, who lives in the modern day.
“Aaron comes across an artifact and kind of becomes entranced by it,” Walter said. “Little does he know there is a woman who has gone back in time and will remove anything that stands in her way so she can use the artifact to prevent the death of her teenage daughter. It is a high-stakes situation of cat and mouse.”
While the protagonist is living in 2021, Walter explained that parts of the novel take the reader back to as early as the 17thcentury.
“It is actually pretty sinister because this woman is willing to kill and do some pretty awful things,” he said. “I like characters who are antagonists and justify their actions for a certain reason.”
Walter said the urge to write a novel had been lingering with him for many years. He said he loves to read everything from Anne Rice to Stephen King and added that a story his dad told him about an incident that happened in Cuyahoga Valley National Park also served as inspiration for the novel.
“I started by writing a couple of short stories and learning how to work with an editor and a publisher and then went from there,” he said.
With a full-time job as director of the global UX design software team at Rockwell Automation, Walter had to carve out time to write.
“At first it felt like pushing a rock uphill,” he said. “But I started getting myself into a good routine where I would get up early in the morning and give myself time to write. You have to find a system that works for you. It’s not your motivation that will carry you. It’s your system.”
Walter said that the time between writing his first word of the novel and the book being published was roughly eight years.
“Now, the time it took to finish the writing was more like five years,” he said.
The Towpath can be purchased through multiple sources including Amazon and Barnes and Noble. More information can also be found on Walter’s website, jonwalter.com.
“It is also available at some local bookstores,” he said. “The Cuyahoga County Public Library has only three copies and currently there are about 40 holds for it, so I’m trying to see if I can get more copies for the library.”
Walter will be at multiple book-signing events this year, including The Jenks Building in Cuyahoga Falls on Saturday, March 22, at 5 p.m.; Lakewood Public Library on Wednesday, June 18, at 7 p.m.; Cuyahoga County Library Brecksville Branch on Wednesday, July 9, at 7 p.m.; and Akron-Summit County Library Richfield Branch on Wednesday, Sept. 24, at 6:30 p.m.
Walter is currently working on a second novel that also takes place in the area of the Cuyahoga Valley.
“This is a follow up to the first novel with some really bone-chilling stories taking place,” he said. “This story will build on some new characters, but some characters from the first novel will appear. I would like to make this a trilogy.” While he doesn’t have a timeline for the completion of his second novel, Walter said he does not expect the process to take eight years as it did the first time.
Photo caption: Jonathan Walter says he relied on his childhood memory of area parks to pen his new novel, The Towpath. Photo submitted.