Transatlantic author Catriona Ward, 41, published two well-received gothic horror novels, both historical, before switching things up and setting her third, The Last House on Needless Street, on the edge of a forest in contemporary America. It became her breakout book, a bestseller described by Stephen King as a “true nerve-shredder”. Now she’s back with Sundial, a lyrical, twisty tale of a toxic mother-daughter bond that begins as suburban domestic noir and soon hurtles into weirder, more terrifying territory in the Mojave desert. Ward spoke via Zoom from her home on Dartmoor, where she ascribed a light switching itself off mid-interview to the quirks of country living – either that or a spectral presence making itself felt.
What was the starting point for Sundial?
The novel is quite Grand Guignol and if you’re going to do that, it really helps to have small hooks of reality to hang it on, otherwise it can just drift into madness. I knew it was going to be about nature and nurture, and I wanted to do something on behaviour modification. Then I discovered that as part of its MK-Ultra project, the CIA had installed electrodes in dogs’ brains, to essentially turn them into remote control dogs. Finding that experiment was this little talismanic moment of, “This is going to work.”
