Welcome back for another UnCommon Bodies interview. Today Vasil Tuchkov is here to talk about his mysterious tale, In Her Image.
What attracted you to the UnCommon Bodies project?
A fellow writer showed me the UnCommon Bodies project, as he thought my work might be a good fit for it. He was right, as I like to think of myself as an “enemy of symmetry”, and a fan of the odd and quirky (which inevitably seems to sneak into my work even when I’m going for a straightforward narrative). The prompt’s cover was cool, and the part about the “misfits” caught me. My thoughts were that I had just the animal for this gathering of weird ones, and as it turned out, it was well accepted.
What are you most proud of about the story?
What I like about In Her Image is the attempt to put into words a thing that is beyond a description; an ephemeral moment reached (and lost) by a craftsman in the pursuit of mastery. Immune to the strive for perfection, an unexpected brink of brilliance that cannot be contained. Naturally, I failed, as by definition, it is impossible to pin down the “thing”.
What was the hardest thing about writing the story? Or was it just a walk in the park? 🙂
It was one of those, a story that writes itself in one sitting.
Any plans to revisit the world of your story?
As the last line reads: “The recorder cycles one last turn, chews on tape, and stops.”
What do you hope readers will take away from the story?
My intuitive aim was to leave the reader with an unexplained feeling of eerie, a heaviness that settled in my chest after some Brian Evenson stories. Not sure if I succeeded, the reader will know.
Once readers have read your story, which of your books/stories should they read next?
I have two stories after In Her Image, Feline Love and Drifter, both hovering in the grim orbit, and with luck, they’ll find their weirdly cozy homes, too. In addition to those, I would throw in my novel Cyan, and the story Hello, Massage, which recently won the Draper’s Guild Short Story Contest.
AboutVasil Tuchkov
Vasil Tuchkov is a graduate from the American Unviversity in Bulgaria. He writes fiction primarily in English, though he is a full-bred Bulgarian. Vasil is a professional self-employed multi-media artist – practicing in the areas Guerrilla Marketing and conceptual design. He spent time abroad as both emigrant and traveler; was lucky to live in San Francisco, LA, Las Vegas, Odessa and Kiev – the Ukraine, Scotland, and Amsterdam.
His first novel Trumping Fate, Vasil wrote in Bulgarian at age 15, which at 17 he published with a major genre publisher in the country – Bard (www.bard.bg). At the time he was into fantasy, and so was his work – a fantasy trilogy, later translated into Russian and published in the Ukraine.
He is also the founder of “Living Museum” and “Living WEB”, a dynamic platform for installations and festival, fusing art and technology (http://www.enterlivingweb.com ; See his TedTalk for more clarity) .
His novel Cyan was short-listed for Rethink-Press’ New Novel Competition 2014.
In addition to Cyan, Tuchkov has a completed novella, a bunch of short stories, and two novels in progress.
Check back tomorrow for the next UnCommon Bodies interview.
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[UnCommon Bodies Q&A:Vasil Tuchkov by Philip Harris first appeared on Solitary Mindset on 19th November 2015]