We’ve all had experience with our “fight or flight” response. Like when a fly cruises past our ear and we panic run for the front door of our house yelling, “BEE!! BEE!!”
Or is that just me?
It’s this instinct that — in the following email interview — writer Catherine McCarthy says was the inspiration for her psychological horror novella The House At The End Of Lacelean Street (paperback, Kindle).
Well, that and the dentist.
To start, what is The House At The End Of Lacelean Street about?
The House At The End Of Lacelean Street is set in a Victorian mansion in the U.K., around the late 1990s, though nothing in the plot is specific, purely because I wanted to portray an other worldly vibe, a world where both reader and characters are uncertain of how much of what they’re experiencing is real and how much of it is imagined.
The story follows three distinct characters who find themselves boarding a bright yellow bus at midnight during a storm — destination Lacelean Street. None of them have ever heard of Lacelean Street, nor do they have any clue as to what has triggered them to flee from home, leaving behind all their possessions and memories.
Oh, and one more thing…the house itself is, in a way, a fourth character. This will become clearer as you read the book.
Where did you get the idea for The House At The End Of Lacelean Street?
Many aspects of human psychology fascinate me, none less so than our physiological flight or fight response to stress or trauma. It’s something we all experience to a degree, it’s in our DNA and has been part of us since prehistoric times, though each of us experience it differently and to varying degrees.
In the novella, I chose three diverse characters: a nineteen-year-old girl, a middle-aged woman, and an elderly man, all of whom hail from very different backgrounds with very different “flight” triggers. During their time at the house, the reason for them having fled their past lives will gradually become clear. Each will rediscover their past before having to decide on what the future might hold for them.
And is there any significance to the house being a red brick one as opposed to being white stucco or ranch style or just some other kind of house?
There are two reasons for the house being built of red brick.
Firstly, the house is an imposing Victorian building, and such bricks were commonly used during that period of house building, so the red bricks were simply a practical choice.
Secondly, as a child, the dental surgery I would visit was housed in such a building — an actual house, not a modern office type building. This was not an uncommon experience here in the U.K., especially in times past.
Though I was not particularly afraid of visiting the dentist, I’d be lying if I said it was a pleasant experience. My mum and I would travel by bus (not a yellow one, as in the story) and would alight at the start of a long street which eventually led to the dental surgery. That sense of impending doom as we walked along the street stuck with me.
The house in the story is very similar to the one from my memory — a tall red-bricked building with a long graveled drive, a porch and door set on an angle at the corner of the house rather than at the center. You entered a tiled hallway, complete with coat-rack and wooden table, before being shown into the room where the dentist was situated.
I remember the smell all these years later: furniture polish, clove oil, rubber masks, especially since back then tooth extractions were carried out using nitrous oxide and oxygen gas which would put you to sleep. I remember this vividly — the semi-lucid state during which I would dream, and also the sickness that inevitably followed, the blood and anesthetic spat into a white bowl. That is the kind of atmosphere I wanted to conjure for the house on Lacelean Street.
The House At The End Of Lacelean Street sounds like it’s a horror story…
Yes, it is fundamentally a horror story, but there are so many subgenres within horror that it’s sometimes difficult to pin down a specific one.
I would describe The House At The End Of Lacelean Street as psychological horror with a touch of the cosmic, but it is also a speculative mystery story. On the surface, it’s a story about a spooky house, but at its core it’s far deeper than that.
To sum it up, think foreboding atmosphere and a sense of impending doom rather than gore or jump scare, because it’s neither of those.
The House At The End Of Lacelean Street is your third novella after Immortelle and Mosaic, though you’ve also written two novels (A Moonlit Path Of Madness and The Wolf And The Favors) and two short story collections (Mists And Megaliths and Door And Other Twisted Tales). What do consider to be the big influences on this story, literary and not?
I guess I’m somewhat unusual in this aspect, but my writing is not often inspired by movies or TV shows. Yes, there are subconscious influences going on as I write, for example the image and mood of the sanatorium in one of my favorite films, A Cure For Wellness, or the library in The Mummy, but neither of them directly influenced the plot or setting.
That said, throughout the novella I give an intentional nod to Stephen King’s It and also The Great God Pan (as featured in The Wind In The Willows by Kenneth Grahame). As a fan of both writers, and also Arthur Machen, it was my way of paying tribute while at the same time incorporating symbolic meaning into the characters’ lives and experiences.
Now, while it may not be influenced by movies, it actually sounds like The House At The End Of Lacelean Street could work as a movie.
I would dearly love to see The House At The End Of Lacelean Street adapted for the screen. The setting is concise and yet varied enough to work on screen, I believe. I think it would also work as a play. In fact, an early reader has already messaged me to say it reminds them of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting For Godot. As a play about the meaning of life, and with absurd elements similar to those in Lacelean Street, it’s an honor for my writing to be compared with a fellow Celt and such an incredible writer as Beckett.
So, if someone wanted to make that movie who would you want them to cast as Claudia and the other main characters?
If I had the choice I would cast Olivia Colman [The Father] as Claudia because I think she portrays the right balance of emotion and down-to-earth tenacity to do the character justice.
As Stacey, I would cast Rooney Mara [The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo], and as Howard I would have cast Michael Gambon [The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou] were he still with us.
As for the house, well, it would have to be that old dental surgery I visited as a child.
So, is there anything else you think people need to know about The House At The End Of Lacelean Street?
The character of Stacey is based on a person I knew in real life, and much of what happens to her is very similar. I can’t give too much away here, or it will spoil the plot. Suffice it to say that the “sister” incident is every bit as tragic and true as what the real life character experienced.
Finally, if someone enjoys The House At The End Of Lacelean Street, which of your other books would you suggest they read next?
This is a tricky question, because The House At The End Of Lacelean Street is, in some ways, quite different to my other work.
That said, I think I would recommend Mosaic, as it has the same modern gothic and cosmic elements as Lacelean Street, and also a similar tragic vibe.
