"You can dive into many universes, because you will "come back". This is the magic of fictional worlds, this is the power of any art, literature or music, cinema or something else. It's immersion. There are so many of them that it makes no sense to stay in one."

While the book is being printed, we would like to share an interesting conversation with the illustrator of "Bones and Stardust" - Oleksiy Shcherbak. They talked about how he was looking for images of the main characters and whether he would like to stay in the world of "Silence"?

Lyosh, were there any difficulties when you were working on the book "Bones and Stardust" by Redgrain Lebowski?

I don't remember any particular difficulties. The work went quite quickly, there were not many illustrations. It was interesting and a little unusual to make a non-figurative cover, but I'm glad that they stopped at this decision!

Which of the main characters do you like the most?

Luka seemed to me quite unexpected at some points. I would probably single him out.

How did you look for the images of the heroes? Maybe he was inspired by something?

It was in this case that the characters were completely formed in my imagination and I did not use references at all. I was interested in conveying the images according to my feeling, I did not want to make a direct resemblance to some cultural style of clothing in order to emphasize the otherness of the universe. At the same time, I tried not to make them too "fantasy", I tried to leave some restraint and a touch of darkness. He reasoned and looked for connections in the facial features and characters of the characters.

Was the book close to you?

Yes, somewhere in the middle I began to read especially and already "got the taste". I really liked the atmosphere of the work.

"Bones and Stardust" is the first part of the "Silence" series. What is the difference between working on a series and working on a single book that you previously illustrated ("Jane Eyre", "Collection of Gothic stories "Love and the Afterlife")

First of all, the difference in the number of illustrations and the apparently less traditional format of the illustration frames, i.e. additional things, in addition to the illustrations, for greater immersion in the atmosphere of the book.

Would you like to live in the world of "Silence"?

No. This is the magic of fictional worlds, this is the power of almost any art, be it literature or music, cinema or something else. It's immersion. You can dive into many universes because you will "come back". There are so many of them that it makes no sense to stay in one. No. This is the magic of fictional worlds, this is the power of any art, be it literature or music, cinema or something else It's immersion. You can dive into many universes because you will "come back". There are so many of them that there are none it makes sense to stay in one.And if it is meant in a practical sense to stay and be like one of the heroes, then probably not either)