Let's begin with your childhood. A commonplace question, but who did you want to be when you grew up?
When I was ten I dreamed of becoming a knight. For this I even professionally took up fencing, by the way, secretly from my parents. I told them that I was going out with friends, but, in fact, I rushed to fencing classes. Moreover, I even did equestrian sports, but not for long. When I became an adult, I dreamed of becoming a psychotherapist.
"Life is an illusion of existence. And we are wingless angels in it.
What do you like most about being a writer?
Maybe time. The time I can take for myself. To be perfectly frank, I began to write my first novel “The Blue Molinia“ to speak out. It was during the first months of the war. Everyone around me was having their own hard time, so I realised that I had no right to complain to my close people about my problems. Being unable to keep everything inside I started writing. Writing by hand, with pencil on paper. And until now writing is my escape as it was then. The time you spend with yourself and your thoughts.
Was there a book in your life that greatly influenced you?
It was probably the first book that I read because I really wanted to - A. Grin "Scarlet Sails." And I give credit for advising this book and probably for all my love for literature to my school teacher of foreign literature. It was she who revealed to me the secret world of adventure and tranquility that the book pages hide behind.
If you could be a character in a book or a movie, who would you be?
It's no secret that my nickname is Strickland. It is taken from the novel by S. Maugham "The Moon and the Penny". This is the story of a fairly successful person who gives up everything and follows the dream. As a child, when I first read the novel, I was very impressed with Charles' courage. Some people might say that he is selfish, but for me he is a character who dared to be happy against the system.
Would you like to change something in your past?
Never. All my actions and words in the past were justified by something, it means I really wanted that. So to this day I never regret anything. I consider it to be a waste of time. In reality we cannot change our past. Then why even think about what you would like to change. I live by the principle of the moment - if at a certain period of my life I want something, then I will always do it. And it doesn’t matter how it will look. My words and actions may offend someone, but I am always ready to take responsibility for it.
What is your ideal atmosphere for creativity?
The atmosphere doesn’t matter to me. I can write anywhere - outside in the park, in the coffee shop, in the noisy bar and on the bathroom floor. I have one condition - I must be sober, not hungover. I never managed to write anything good with alcohol in my blood. I always envied writers who could afford to write with a glass of red wine. That seems like the atmosphere.
How much does your productivity depend on inspiration?
Not at all. Maybe it's not good, but inspiration is not important to me. You either write, or you fool around. It's hard for me to even talk about inspiration, muses or something like that. I still can't understand how I write. I took courses of novelists, read many books on how to write novels and watched many interviews on this subject. All writers have different principles, although they all intersect in one parallel. I can say that I haven’t found this parallel yet. I don't know if it's good or bad. I just write because I breathe, and breathe because I write.