Daily Inspiration: Meet Gary Johnson

Today we’d like to introduce you to Gary Johnson

Hi Gary, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Mom wrote a hot check to put gas in our 1971 Toyota Corolla so she could get to the hospital. Dad drove. For those who don’t know, a hot check means you wrote down an amount of money you didn’t have in your bank account. You hoped you could deposit some money before the check cleared because if you didn’t…the hot check would turn into a bounced check. It was the 1980s, and so long as your face wasn’t posted up for writing bad checks, you had a little wiggle room as a poor person. Mom didn’t have money for the hospital either. Things would get worse, too. Dad was months away from falling off a roof and breaking his back. But we were broke before that happened. The car they brought me home in had an exhaust leak. You’d think I was exaggerating if I told you where we lived at that time.

But I was a welcomed baby, regardless. My father was thirty-four and on his third wife, but I was his first child. He and my grandfather were ecstatic. Grandpa danced a jig on hearing I was a boy. Mom wanted a girl. She was twenty-one. I am her only child, but I was not her first dependant. Aside from a newborn and poverty to contend with, she also had a husband who was the embodiment of all heavy-drinking, construction-working, Vietnam Veteran stereotypes. He was strong, handsome, and charming when he wasn’t a belligerent powder keg. His demons were his drinking buddies. They did their best to destroy us along with him.

Mom is indestructible, though. More so than I. In the summer of 1986, Dianna Johnson endured thirty-six hours of labor to bring out a son with a remarkably large head. As of winter 2025, her son has published six novels and sired a large body of written work, photography, and miscellaneous art.

And I’ve hardly dedicated enough of it to her.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
There are plenty of smooth things that kill you. Black ice for example. The road is unpredictable. Even so, it has been Mom’s truest companion since I was in elementary school. I learned more from it than anywhere else, too. Mom drove box trucks loaded with thousands of pounds of automotive parts that she unloaded at mechanic shops all over the western United States. She’s driven through every vehicular catastrophe you can imagine. If you’re picturing her as some kind of wide-shouldered, square-jawed trucker, you’re wrong. She’s more like Debra Winger in Urban Cowboy. That’s the girl John Travolta’s character was in love with.

I rode with her when I didn’t have school and helped unload the truck at each stop. It was the closest thing to luxury I had then. She tried to stay at hotels that had swimming pools. We ate in restaurants. I got to watch cable in the hotel room. I loved watching the scenery go by as we drove–once, a pheasant exploded on the window beside me. The bird had made a fatal miscalculation when swooping across the highway. A drunk man in Scottsbluff, Nebraska, squeegeed the blood and brains off. He was acting like a service attendant pumping gas for tips. Undoubtedly, he would have cleaned the window for free. People liked my mom. She’s a top notch salesperson. That’s why her company wanted her to deliver their parts…the men bought more. She cussed, smoked, and drank just like them, too. She knew about fixing cars. A few of her customers proposed to her through the years.

My father left when I was 12. I packed his bag. Before that, I had to call the police on him more than once. The morning after one of our police visit nights, we took to the road and drove straight to Las Vegas in a 1978 Z-28 Camaro. It was July. We had no air conditioning. I shared the backseat with our German Shepherd-ish mutt, Jones. Mom drove. Dad drank.

It was the last time we were all on the same road together.

Starting at 13, I took 36 hour Greyhound bus rides to visit my Dad in Arizona. All things considered, I loved and admired him. He was aware of what his demons did to us, and tried to compensate for them. I kept hoping he’d get better.

He lived in an RV in the back of a trailer park. I spent most of those summers riding my bike all over Prescott, avoiding him while he got hammered. But he was unavoidable. I had to sleep above him.

Dad was what I call “movie hero delusional” often, acting out as if he were Clint Eastwood or someone fighting the “bad guys.” I did three things while trapped in the RV as he was shouting at the drug dealers in our trailer park. I listened to depressing music on maximum volume, read depressing books above my grade level, and dreamed of having a beautiful girl run away with me. I usually died heroically in those love fantasies.

That dream did come true. The beautiful girl part, anyway. Twenty years of marriage later, there is no doubt that I am most proud of my lovely wife and the two uber-talented sons she brought into this world.

There’s no sense in listing the nightmares I’ve endured between then and now. Yes, bad things have happened to me. Yes, I have documented mental and physical health conditions that make day-to-day life daunting at times. However, the things that haunt me most are those I witnessed happening to others. I’ve been ringside for more than a few deaths. All things considered, I’m an incredibly blessed individual with a tremendous amount of survivor guilt at times. I modulate between moments of intense fear and surreal ecstasy. All of this is the genesis of my literary art.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Much of my work is overtly cathartic. It’s ‘R’ rated. I write literary fiction.

My first novel–The Shiner–chronicles the murder of a homeless man who’d recovered from drug abuse and was getting back on his feet.

My second novel–He Laughs–tells the story of a mother convinced her son would be a school shooter and decides to execute him first.

My third novel–The Scenic Route–is a drug and booze-fueled buddy comedy with a road trip plotline.

My fourth novel–Dark Harvest–is about a new-age spirituality cult leading its members to mass slaughter by extraterrestrials.

My fifth novel–Gravestones for Giants–is a shootout between mountain town sheriffs and a deranged man holding a boy hostage.

My art specializes in getting as close to an existential black hole as possible without being destroyed by it—desperation for the light born out of deprivation. However, I’ve nearly toppled into oblivion on more than one occasion.

My most recent novel–A More Perfect Union–is the first release of a new indie imprint called Kinda Vague Publishing. My publisher is also a record label featuring two rock bands I manage (Circles We Draw & Pinetree Janitorial Service). We are an artists’ collective competing for broader recognition in our home market to help our members progress into larger markets.

I am incredibly proud to be Kinda Vague Publishing’s first release. A More Perfect Union is a political dystopian novel with a would-be suicide bomber as the main character. It’s also a big middle finger raised at the two-party system and the violent division it generates.

That sets me apart from most authors in the scene. I don’t bother trumpeting the horn for anyone’s agenda. I’m content to piss off just about every political zealot. I’m too lazy to advocate for anarchy, though.

What were you like growing up?
I had the sort of personality that got you sent to the school psychologist. It started in the third grade. They said I was too serious for a child. It didn’t help that I was obsessed with WWII history and tried to teach myself German. I’ve continued to be under the observation of counselors and therapists to this day. Spiritual advisors, too.

My antisocial behavior has always been paradoxical in a sense. I love people, study them intensely, and am terrified of them too. My clinical observers have also found my case interesting. I have my father’s charisma. I’ve always been considered an attractive boy (to my peril at times). The popular kids and various cliques have always welcomed me. I love being on stage. Generally I’m placed in leadership positions. On face value, I should have thrived.

And yet…I just can’t wholeheartedly assimilate into a group or internalize their affection. It’s this perpetual otherness I carry with me that I’ve tried to understand through my art that continues to unravel me occasionally.

So, if any of this self-absorbed blah, blah, blah has piqued your interest I invite you to see the things that constantly cross my mind by reading my books. I’m held hostage by the visions that feed my work.

I don’t “think up stories” as an author. I report on the horrors and travesties swirling inside. There is no moment where I decided to become an author and artist, either. This is just what I do. I’ve tried to quit, really.

If I could have been an architect or a dentist I would have been. Sorry, Mom. But who knows, maybe someday I’ll do something big enough so you won’t have to drive for a living anymore. Thanks for always supporting my art, no matter how dark or weird it gets.

Love ya, Maw.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://Www.kindavaguerecords.com
• Instagram: @ga_the_novelist
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GAtheNovelist
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@cinemafiaproductions?si=pyxR-jNDFK6f6q-g
• Other: https://linktr.ee/gajohnson