Anjali Sachdeva’s short story collection, All the Names They Used for God, won the 2019 Chautauqua Prize and the 2022 Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire (France). Her fiction has been published in Lightspeed, Tor.com, and Strange Horizons, and featured on the LeVar Burton Reads podcast. She teaches in the full- and low-residency MFA programs at Chatham University and the low-residency MFA program at Randolph College, and she loves working with students who write weird and wonderful things. “Chimera” is her second appearance in Uncanny, a beautifully written story of identity, futuristic technology, and family conflict.
Uncanny Magazine: “Chimera” is a poignant story of a mother learning to accept her son as he is, set in a future where brains can be transferred to synthetic bodies and reality TV has competitions in advanced bioengineering. What was your starting point or inspiration for the story?
Anjali Sachdeva: Well first I was watching some reality show—I think it was Project Runway—and one of the contestants was talking about being estranged from his family. And I just thought, how wild would that be, to be estranged from your child but then be able to watch them on TV?
But in a bigger sense, it came out of conversations with other parents, including parents of trans kids, some of whom found it easy to support their children’s transitions and others who struggled, despite deeply loving their kids. And from thinking about how my own kids might change or come into their own as they get older, in ways I can’t imagine right now. Being a speculative fiction writer is good practice for that, because you’re always considering ways the world could be different, but I’m not arrogant enough to think I can’t be caught off guard or that I’ll always be able to meet my children with the understanding they deserve.
Uncanny Magazine: What was the easiest part of writing this story? What was the most challenging thing?
Anjali Sachdeva: The easiest parts were the reality show scenes, because they were fun to write. While I enjoy those kinds of shows, there really is a very precise formula to them, right down the self-consciously dramatic way the judges react to each round of the competition to make things feel as dire as possible, when in fact there is nothing life-changing at stake.
The hardest parts were the family dialogues, especially that big Thanksgiving dinner scene. I wanted to convey that these are family members who love each other, and yet they are all going to say things they will regret later. It’s tough to strike that balance of having a character say something awful without making them seem irredeemable or heartless.
Uncanny Magazine: “Chimera” does a beautiful job depicting the tension and conflict within the family, and developing the characters, especially Savita and Jay. What do you need to know about your characters before you start writing? Do they ever do anything that surprises you?
Anjali Sachdeva: To be honest, I rarely know much about my characters before I start writing. I don’t start with characters; I start with a concept and build outward from there. So the characters always surprise me. Working through what the human consequences of a change will be—whether that’s a change in technology, or a new life form, or a surreal shift in the rules of the world we live in—is the part of speculative fiction that I love best.
Uncanny Magazine: Do you watch reality show competitions, and if so, do you have a favorite?
Anjali Sachdeva: I do love The Great British Baking Show, in part because, as many Americans have noted, it’s kinder and gentler than most reality shows. No one’s ever talking smack on the other contestants (at least not on camera), people help each other out if they finish baking before time is up, and no one ever gets shouted at. And there’s no money at stake, which I think is lovely—people are in it for the glory. But perversely, I have a longstanding love for America’s Next Top Model, which is the absolute opposite. Tyra Banks and the other judges will take contestants to task over almost nothing, everyone’s catty, and the entire thing is clearly designed to apply maximum pressure in the hopes that someone will snap. But what can I say, I love watching amateurs trying to model with tarantulas crawling across their faces, and seeing how entirely different a person can look with different clothes, makeup, and camera angles.
Uncanny Magazine: Who are some of your literary influences? What’s something you read recently and loved?
Anjali Sachdeva: My influences range pretty widely, as I’m a sucker for both a wild storyline and a beautiful sentence. I love those late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century short stories—O. Henry, Guy de Maupassant, Kate Chopin—that have a real bang in the final lines, and they’ve definitely influenced the way I write. But I’ve also inherited so much from speculative and slipstream writers who wrap their ideas in really dazzling language: Kevin Brockmeier, Kij Johnson, Salman Rushdie.
Recent favorites: The Gospel of Salome by Kaethe Schwehn, a truly gorgeous piece of feminist historical fiction set in Rome, the kind of book that makes you question so many of your assumptions about the ancient world. And The World with Its Mouth Open by Zahid Rafiq, a collection of wonderfully crafted short stories set in Kashmir.
Uncanny Magazine: What are you working on next?
Anjali Sachdeva: I’m working on a new collection of stories centered around human interactions with nature, particularly focused on what happens when humans overstep their space in the world. As with many people, this is constantly on my mind, so I’m glad to be writing stories that help me think through it all.
Uncanny Magazine: Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us!
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