For his contribution, Derrick meditated a moment on the things that make people afraid to enter a place. In his literature class, when they did Edgar Allan Poe, they spent almost the whole time talking about fear of the unknown; to him this was a sort of training-wheels fear. The unknown is too vast and shapeless to be a threat. To Derrick, harm, the prospect of it, was the deciding quantity: the possibility that something inside will hurt you. That’s the stuff that makes you cross the street to avoid a house. It’s the chance that there’s something inside that might leave a mark on you. You’d be even more scared if you knew what it was.

— Devil House by John Darnielle (Page 221 - 222)