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0:44

know they they always talk about are

0:47

you a plotter or a panzer and

0:49

I would say the combination of both

0:51

because I do want to have the

0:53

big goal posts in mind. You know

0:55

how the beginning a middle and then

0:57

before you start, but you know not

0:59

with. All. The details and

1:02

things obviously change. So I had

1:04

mentioned this audio a series that

1:06

I'm working on and I did

1:08

the same thing. I didn't outline

1:10

of all the episodes and I

1:13

thought I knew how is going

1:15

to end and I wrote that

1:17

down. But then when you're actually

1:19

writing different ideas come through and

1:21

then it wasn't till I was

1:24

writing the last episode that I

1:26

decided ah this is the any

1:28

you know it because you've been

1:30

working. On this for a while now

1:32

and then you have get different ideas and

1:34

I passed by the producer and she thought

1:37

it was much better than what I had

1:39

originally. And

1:44

walker back to the Rudder Files

1:46

I am. you're grateful Host Talton

1:49

Read: recently purchased Patients Observers Per

1:51

usual, Oscar nominated screenwriter turn novelist

1:53

Irish Yamashita returned to chat with

1:55

me. But the difference between writing

1:57

for the ear and the screen?

2:00

using plotting and pantsing and her

2:02

anticipated follow-up thriller, Village in the

2:05

Dark. Iris has been

2:07

working in Hollywood for over 15 years and

2:09

was nominated for a Best Original Screenplay Oscar

2:11

for the movie, Letters to Iwo Jima, directed

2:14

by Clint Eastwood. The

2:16

sequel to her debut novel, City Under One

2:18

Roof, is Village in the Dark, described as

2:20

a riveting mystery perfect for fans of Twin

2:22

Peaks, Mayor of Easttown,

2:24

and True Detective. An

2:27

Amazon editor's pick for Best Mystery, Thriller, and Suspense, Kirk

2:30

has reviewed the book A Sharp

2:32

and Gritty Mystery with a compelling

2:35

socio-political undercurrent. Iris continues

2:37

to work in Hollywood developing for both film and

2:39

streaming media, and she has taught screenwriting at UCLA

2:41

and AFI. In this

2:44

file, Iris and I discussed why you need

2:46

to have a beginning, middle, and end no

2:48

matter what you're writing, what it's

2:51

like to be both the writer and director as

2:53

a novelist, how to write for audio

2:55

drama, why filmmakers don't like to

2:57

read, learning the rules so

2:59

you can break them, how to

3:01

keep your dreams alive, and a lot more. Stay

3:04

calm and write on, but don't forget

3:07

you can always support this show by

3:09

heading to writerfiles.fm, or

3:11

you can also sign up for email

3:14

updates and other resources for writers. And

3:16

if you're a fan of The Writer Files,

3:18

please click follow to automatically

3:21

see new interviews in your podcatcher

3:23

as soon as they're published, and

3:25

drop us a rating or a

3:27

review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or

3:29

wherever you tune in to help

3:31

other writers find us. Yes,

3:37

we are back on The Writer Files.

3:39

I am honored today to be joined

3:41

by a returned guest. We

3:43

have our friend Oscar-nominated

3:46

scribe and novelist, Irish

3:48

Yamashita, hanging out with us today. Thank you

3:50

so much for taking the time to do

3:52

this. Thank you so much for

3:54

having me. I'm excited to be back. Yeah,

3:56

this is cool because I love

3:58

chatting with authors. about craft and

4:00

their latest projects and of course

4:03

we get another chance to pick

4:06

your brain about all things screenwriting

4:09

and fiction. But yeah, let's wind the

4:11

clock back a little bit and just

4:13

talk about kind of where

4:15

you've been because I think we

4:17

talked almost exactly one year ago

4:19

today about the city

4:22

under one roof. And

4:24

now we're back with a sequel, which is really

4:27

cool to see but yeah, tell

4:29

us a little bit about kind of what you've been

4:31

up to the last year. Yes, so city

4:33

under one roof came out January

4:36

last year. So yes, it's been

4:38

almost almost

4:40

exactly a year in a month

4:42

and village in the dark came out

4:44

in February. So very excited.

4:47

That's pretty much

4:49

mainly what I've been working on for

4:51

the past year. But

4:54

I've also been working on

4:56

a audio series, which I'm

4:59

almost done writing, which will be

5:02

coming out later this year. Amazing. I can't

5:04

wait to talk about that too. That must

5:06

be fun. And of course, that's a little

5:08

bit different, but more similar to the

5:11

screenwriting stuff, right? Yes, it

5:13

is. You know,

5:15

working in different media has been

5:18

very exciting. Each one has its

5:20

challenges, its differences, but it's kind

5:22

of fun to go from

5:25

heavy description and

5:29

then audio is heavy

5:31

dialogue and not a lot of description.

5:34

So it's kind of

5:36

interesting to try to work those different

5:38

muscles. Interesting. Yeah, I want to talk

5:40

about that. Very cool. Yeah,

5:43

let's talk about the

5:45

latest. And yeah, how are you feeling

5:47

now that your sequel is out in

5:49

the world? What's the vibe over there?

5:51

Are you feeling pretty confident?

5:53

Are you kind of doing some

5:56

touring stuff, obviously some promotional

5:59

things? How are you

6:01

feeling? Yeah, the

6:03

publicity end of this is

6:05

something I'm not used to

6:07

because in screenwriting,

6:10

usually everybody wants to talk to the

6:12

director and the actors and not

6:15

as much to the writer, but

6:18

on the novel, obviously, you're

6:20

it. Yeah,

6:24

it's not something that I was

6:26

used to, but I'm starting to

6:28

get a better understanding of and

6:31

the social media aspect also is

6:33

something I wasn't used to

6:35

and trying to get caught

6:37

up on all the social media platforms

6:39

and what you need to be doing,

6:41

which it seems like it's a full-time

6:44

job in itself. So I

6:47

don't know how a lot

6:49

of writers do podcasting

6:52

like you do and

6:55

it seems like, wow, you

6:57

have another full-time job practically.

7:00

Yeah, that's really interesting that you raise

7:02

that point because now that

7:05

we've noted so many times before, even

7:08

as you get bigger and

7:10

more well-known as an author,

7:12

as a fictionist, as

7:14

a novelist, as you said, you are

7:17

the writer and the director and you're wearing

7:19

all these hats because you're also your best

7:23

PR person, right? Unless you're at

7:25

the stage of your career where

7:27

you're hiring an assistant

7:30

to do that kind of thing, it's really

7:32

interesting that, yeah, you've got to wear these

7:34

different hats. Yeah, yeah, I

7:36

have to brush up some

7:38

of my Adobe skills. Wow.

7:44

But I mean, it's

7:47

fun. It's great to be

7:49

able to interact with

7:51

readers and things. That's been very

7:53

rewarding. Yeah, yeah. I bet.

7:57

Well, that's cool. And of course, you

8:00

know, congrats on the reception to the

8:02

latest, called One Hell of

8:04

a Follow-Up to your debut, among

8:07

other things, highly atmospheric, suspense

8:09

thriller. I thought it was cool that

8:11

Kirkus had noted it was a sharp,

8:13

gritty mystery with a compelling

8:16

socio-political undercurrent. Of course, that's what

8:19

some of our best fiction does,

8:21

it kind of taps the

8:23

vein. But yeah, since City

8:25

Under One Roof now with Village in the

8:27

Dark as its kind of follow-up,

8:31

yeah, I mean, I'd love to talk about where it

8:33

goes next, but also kind of some of the inspiration

8:35

that went into the latest. Yes, so City

8:39

Under One Roof, as you

8:41

mentioned, it was the first book in the series, and

8:44

it takes place in a

8:46

very isolated city in Alaska,

8:49

where all 200 and some residents live

8:53

in a single high-rise building. And

8:56

the only way to get there is through the

8:58

single lane tunnel. And

9:00

so it's very isolated. It was

9:03

originally built as a military outpost.

9:06

And so I have the protagonist who

9:08

is an outsider, she comes

9:10

from Anchorage, who gets kind of

9:12

trapped into this world. And

9:16

she solves a crime in the first book,

9:18

but she doesn't think it's related

9:21

at all to her family,

9:23

which her husband and her son went

9:26

missing when they went hiking.

9:28

And so she

9:30

believed that they had perished in

9:33

a hiking accident. But

9:36

in the second book, it starts

9:38

with her, she's gotten a clue that

9:41

maybe there was some foul play involved.

9:44

So it begins with her exhuming

9:47

their bodies and getting them autopsied.

9:49

And so the second book is

9:51

more personal. It's about her family

9:53

and finding answers to what happened

9:55

to them. Yeah, And of

9:58

course, raising the question of... Will

10:01

there be a third?

10:03

I. Didn't originally and

10:05

ten to have. A

10:07

third book. I'm fit. I'm. Not gonna

10:09

say that I won't be writing

10:11

a third, but but the idea

10:13

that I have for my next

10:16

mysteries in a completely different world

10:18

with different different protagonists and characters.

10:20

But I mean aside to say

10:22

that I won't come back and

10:24

revisit. This world because they yeah

10:26

I first saw many people giving

10:28

me such as citizens You know

10:31

what are you to do this

10:33

for the third book and wingsuit

10:35

South America. Are.

10:49

More her summer and of course before

10:51

to whatever comes next for your own

10:54

and or go to outrun the latest

10:56

villas in the Dark which of course

10:58

will learn to you and your home

11:00

births there and I connect with your

11:02

on the socials as well. But yeah

11:05

I mean I would love to talk

11:07

a little bit about kind of how

11:09

your process may have evolved because you

11:11

know I'll just remind you that the

11:14

last time you turn on you know

11:16

we just got talk about kind of.

11:19

The. The transition for you from

11:21

from movie World's to i'm you

11:23

know kind of making this dream

11:26

of becoming a novelist and to

11:28

reality and how you'd recently written

11:30

it as a Tv pilot. And.

11:32

Then I'm kind of transformed into a

11:34

novel which is really cool story. but

11:36

yeah, talk a little bit about in

11:39

are you still because you'd you'd mentioned

11:41

something about vomit drafting what I thought

11:43

was released. A funny way to put

11:45

a of course we we all know

11:47

kind of. This. you

11:49

know when you get do have a place

11:51

where you're just kind of you feel like

11:53

he did that words are just coming fast

11:55

and furious me ideas and and obviously i

11:57

love to talk about kind of yeah how

11:59

How that process is working out for you now as

12:01

you're looking to the third one? Yeah,

12:04

I think it's going to be

12:06

pretty similar. I always like to just

12:09

not edit on the first draft and

12:11

just let the

12:13

creative juices flow. But

12:15

I do still like

12:17

to outline a bit in the beginning.

12:21

So they always talk about, are you

12:23

a plotter or a pantser? I

12:25

would say it's a combination of both because I

12:28

do want to have the big goalposts

12:30

in mind. Have a beginning,

12:32

a middle, and end before you

12:35

start, but not with all

12:37

the details. And things obviously

12:40

change. So I had mentioned

12:42

this audio series that I'm working on,

12:44

and I did the same thing. I

12:46

did an outline of all the episodes,

12:49

and I thought I knew how it

12:51

was going to end, and I wrote

12:53

that down. But then when you're actually

12:56

writing different ideas come through,

12:58

and then it wasn't until I

13:00

was writing the last episode that

13:02

I decided, ah,

13:04

this is the ending. Because you've

13:06

been working on this for a

13:08

while now, and you get different ideas. And

13:10

I passed it by the producer, and she

13:13

thought it was much better than what

13:15

I had originally. So yeah, so

13:17

it's a little bit of both. You

13:21

don't want to get stuck in writer's

13:24

block situations. So if you

13:26

have somewhere to go

13:28

that you've already outlined, and

13:31

you can try that first, and

13:34

then go back and change everything later. So that's why

13:36

I call it the vomit draft. Yeah, I

13:38

like that idea of it being

13:41

iterative, but at the same time, you're not

13:43

being too rigid as

13:45

a plotter. You're

13:48

not plotting out each minutiae, if you

13:50

will, throughout, but you're just giving yourself

13:52

that room to play, and then

13:55

change things if needed. Yeah, definitely. I mean,

13:58

usually when I'm writing a book, I'm not going to be writing a book.

14:00

I do the novel

14:02

and I'm outlining, it's not

14:04

going to be more than maybe

14:07

two sentences in a chapter. So

14:10

it's definitely not rigid. But

14:13

sometimes if you

14:15

do have something more detailed already

14:18

in your mind, you can write it

14:20

down and you don't have to follow it. And

14:22

of course, I wanted to talk to you

14:25

because as you said, you've kind of

14:28

shifted between these different medias

14:30

from screenwriting

14:32

to novel

14:34

and writing these very

14:36

atmospheric, claustrophobic

14:39

locked room mysteries to

14:42

now turning to audio

14:44

dramas. As you said,

14:46

there's something very different

14:48

about audio because essentially

14:50

your characters, as

14:53

you said, the dialogue piece is

14:56

in a sense how you're setting the

14:58

scene, unless so in cinema

15:00

because obviously you're using the camera

15:03

to show the scene. So

15:06

talk a little bit about the difference

15:08

and how you are shifting your

15:10

mindset and how you're kind of, again,

15:14

changing between the mediums and

15:17

what that was like for you. Is this the first

15:19

audio drama you've written? Yes, it's

15:21

the first one. And yeah, a

15:24

big change because when you're

15:27

writing screenplays, I taught screenwriting

15:31

and you always say show, don't tell. And

15:34

you always kind of

15:36

try to advise against a narrator,

15:39

a voiceover

15:41

because it tends to take

15:43

you out of the film

15:45

or the visuals. But then

15:48

now that I'm writing audio

15:50

only, you can't

15:52

show. You can

15:54

only tell. So I

15:57

Had to throw that out the window and then

15:59

the only way... Way sometimes to set

16:01

the scene as with a voiceover. So

16:03

now I have a lot of. You.

16:06

Know narrations and voiceovers. So

16:08

I so yeah it's it's

16:10

very it's. It's counter.

16:12

To what I teach

16:15

visually. So so it's

16:17

it's interesting, it's it. I did find

16:19

it on a little difficult cause I'm

16:21

like whoa how they how how are

16:23

you going to know what's going on

16:25

if all you can do is hear

16:27

things And so I have a lot

16:29

over Britain in a sound effects of.

16:33

Months of the sea and now it's

16:35

over. react voice over I've at first

16:37

I thought oh i can I to

16:39

probably worked something out without. Doing.

16:41

A lot of voiceover but once

16:43

I start or might know I

16:45

I have to do the voiceover

16:47

answers. They're just or what is

16:50

a different routes in the plotting

16:52

because going from you know that

16:54

you're running of are specific over

16:56

specific genre and insertion bomb you

16:58

know in the crime and mystery

17:00

is an artist. Are you sticking

17:02

in that same kind of. Know

17:05

you are, you are or is this completely

17:07

a completely different kind of a thing for

17:09

your. Arm it is

17:11

a historical and it has

17:14

to do with. World

17:16

War Two. so. They they kind

17:18

of. They sought me out. Mobs,

17:20

I just kind of landed on

17:22

my lap. And I'm yeah. this

17:25

was during the writers' strike, so

17:27

I wasn't allowed to write for

17:29

screen anyway. And I thought

17:32

ah you know maybe I should try

17:34

this and I had been approached. By

17:36

someone else as well for an

17:38

audio series. but I'm. That.

17:41

When I I kind of I

17:43

turned down ah I'm But then

17:45

this one. It just. Because.

17:48

Because it's an interesting topic which is

17:50

about be up for forty second which

17:52

is. The only

17:55

ah or the all.

17:57

Japanese American Red Summit. fought

18:00

during World War II. So

18:02

the topic really was something that

18:05

I was interested in and they're

18:08

usually... This topic has been

18:11

tried... They've tried to make

18:13

this as a movie

18:15

many, many times, I

18:17

think. And I think because

18:19

of the budget, it's historical.

18:22

And then also because

18:24

it would

18:26

be an all or mostly Japanese-American cast

18:28

that it's difficult to get made.

18:30

But this

18:33

one, they already had the

18:35

budget for it and they

18:38

really want to make it. And so

18:41

I thought, well, okay, I'll

18:43

give it a go. And it's

18:45

been green lit. So hopefully it'll

18:48

be out this... They're

18:51

shooting for fall this year. So... Cool.

18:53

Yeah. That's exciting. Yeah. Do you

18:55

have a working title you can

18:57

share? Yeah, we don't have a

18:59

title yet. I

19:02

use a working title, but I'm not

19:04

sure what it's going to be in the

19:06

end. But it is about the 442nd.

19:09

And I think I'm

19:11

focusing on the Lost Battalion,

19:14

which is a

19:16

big event in the history of

19:18

the 442nd. If anybody knows that.

19:21

Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Some pretty

19:23

serious historical

19:26

fiction then, really. But it's

19:29

not fictional. It's more

19:32

research-heavy? No, it's

19:36

fictional. The

19:39

events are

19:41

nonfiction, but the characters

19:45

and some of

19:47

the things that I'm introducing are... I

19:50

don't know if I would say it's sci-fi, but... Mm,

19:52

that's fun. A little bit

19:55

of out of the box thinking. When

19:58

I pitched it... My

20:00

idea, I was wondering, do you want

20:02

to go really traditional or do you

20:04

want to go out of the box? And

20:07

they all want it out of the box. So

20:10

that's what I'm doing. Very

20:25

cool and very different. We've

20:28

spoken with Aaron Tracy about some

20:30

of his bigger budget

20:32

audio dramas and he really describes

20:35

it as just TV

20:38

for your ears. Oh,

20:40

that's a good way to put it. Yeah,

20:42

because he was a TV producer and TV

20:45

writer and it seemed like kind of

20:47

a natural fit

20:49

for him. Audible Originals. Yeah,

20:52

this one is for the BBC World. Oh,

20:54

cool. Yeah. Amazing.

20:57

Well, that's exciting, Iris. Congrats on

20:59

that. Thank you. Yeah, I mean,

21:01

I kind of wanted to get, I don't know, just

21:03

pick your brain a little bit because as you said,

21:05

you have taught screenwriting, UCLA

21:08

and AFI. And

21:10

yeah, and of course, if you

21:13

were to teach the audio drama,

21:15

I'm sure it would be a completely

21:17

different course outline. But yeah, talk a

21:19

little bit, maybe give us kind of,

21:21

I don't know, just like a mini

21:23

seminar or like you're opening salvo for

21:26

that kind of screenwriting piece because I'm always

21:29

super excited to chat with

21:31

educators about how they

21:33

approach craft and how they kind of

21:36

are transmitting, as

21:38

it were, their expertise to students

21:41

in a classroom where, you know,

21:43

a lot of that learning curve does

21:45

come from probably being on set or, you

21:47

know, as you said, like working with Clint

21:50

Eastwood, which must have been like

21:52

really, really intimidating right out of the

21:54

gates, that you just like, what's

21:57

the learning curve like? And then again,

21:59

how do you... of share that with your

22:01

students. Yes, there is a

22:03

learning curve in every format and

22:06

you know, what you emphasize, as

22:09

I said, like whether it's the

22:11

dialogue or the narration. And I

22:13

can always tell when

22:15

people who started off as

22:18

novel writers who, you know,

22:20

wanted to learn screenwriting would have

22:23

heavy description, which,

22:26

you know, it's great for a novel,

22:28

but not in a screenplay.

22:31

Most people who

22:33

write screen or read screenplays

22:36

don't like to read in general.

22:38

So they don't like to see, it's kind of dumb,

22:41

but they don't like to see long blocks of, you

22:43

know, black ink, because then that means, oh, I

22:45

got to read a lot of stuff here. They

22:49

like to see white pages. But

22:53

I think the tenets of storytelling

22:55

remain the same. So,

22:58

you know, the three

23:01

act structure is something

23:03

I learned in screenwriting. And I think that really

23:05

helped me when I went back

23:08

to writing novels, to

23:10

think in that way, you know,

23:12

you have your beginning, your middle, and your end,

23:15

and you want to have a climax, and you

23:17

know, all the things that

23:19

you learn in screenwriting, you can carry over.

23:22

And, you know, people

23:24

might think it's formulaic, but it

23:27

works. So I always tell

23:29

my students, yeah, you can change, you know,

23:31

you don't have to make it formulaic, but

23:33

learn what the formula is first, and

23:36

then change it, you know, because you, because

23:39

also you usually talk in

23:41

those terms. And I

23:44

think learning about how

23:46

to develop characters is the same

23:48

also, like what is

23:50

your character's arc. And

23:52

so we always talk about that in screenwriting, but

23:54

I think it's a good thing to

23:57

learn about and use in

23:59

other formats as well. Like

24:02

you start off somewhere and

24:04

your character ends up somewhere else at

24:06

the end, not

24:08

just physically, but you know internally.

24:11

So those kind of story tenets

24:14

are useful, I

24:16

would say, for all forms of

24:19

writing. And I think even

24:22

with books nowadays, just

24:24

like film, people

24:26

seem to have shorter attention spans.

24:31

I've been learning that

24:33

people seem to like shorter

24:35

chapters. And that's something

24:38

we teach in screenwriting, that you don't

24:40

want a scene to go on too

24:42

long. Generally,

24:44

in screenwriting,

24:46

you only have like three to four

24:49

pages at most for a scene,

24:51

and usually that's even too long. So

24:56

I'm sure with books, it's a lot

24:58

freer. You can write really long chapters

25:00

if you want. But it's

25:02

interesting when I look at comments, how people,

25:05

oh, I love the short chapters. It

25:08

makes it easier to read. For

25:10

sure. And you know, I mean, you

25:13

really are writing page turners. And there's

25:17

something very gratifying about being

25:19

able to just churn through

25:21

a thriller, a

25:23

mystery, a crime novel, and

25:25

to be able to see the progress that

25:27

you've made. Yeah, that's

25:30

a good point. It may

25:32

be particular to this genre of

25:34

thriller, mystery, that you want

25:37

it to move a little quicker. Obviously,

25:40

if you're writing literary fiction, then

25:42

you could spend a lot more

25:44

time and let it

25:46

breathe a lot more. But it seems like

25:48

in this genre of people like, quick. Yeah,

25:51

very interesting. Well, that's

25:53

cool. And I love your

25:55

take your kind of mini seminar there.

25:59

Because yeah, as you said, the formula is

26:01

working and it's kind of like you

26:03

have to learn the rules to be able to break them, right?

26:06

Exactly, exactly. Yeah, and that

26:08

three act structure, once you learn

26:10

it is like, oh yeah, it's completely

26:12

applicable to really

26:14

any storytelling notice, which

26:16

is cool, but yeah, great, great, great stuff.

26:20

So yeah, interesting. I

26:22

can't remember. Are you a voting

26:24

member of the Academy? No,

26:26

I'm not. And people are always

26:28

surprised about that. Of course, I can vote

26:31

for the Writers Guild. But when

26:33

I, you know, I was a

26:36

newbie when I got nominated and

26:38

I didn't know anything about the rules and what

26:41

you're supposed to do. And I don't think my

26:43

agent knew because she said I was the

26:46

first person she represented who had been

26:48

nominated. And

26:50

so we didn't know about the things

26:52

that you're supposed to do about like campaigning

26:55

to be a member of the Academy, which

26:58

I think they would grant if you were nominated

27:00

for an award.

27:03

But since we didn't

27:06

campaign, because I do

27:08

have to get endorsements from

27:10

other Academy writers and

27:14

I had no clue about any of that stuff. And

27:16

then later I found out,

27:19

you know, that that's what you're supposed to do.

27:21

But by then it was too late. And then

27:23

I did, you know, I did kind of ask

27:25

later the Academy to you,

27:27

you know, is it okay

27:30

if you know, your past Academy

27:32

nominee and they kind of said no.

27:35

Interesting. Didn't know that. Yeah,

27:38

I didn't know all the rules. And it seemed

27:40

like when I found out it was a little

27:42

too late. Well, that is really interesting. So

27:45

yeah, as it is, Oscar season,

27:48

and we have you on the

27:51

line here on the hook. Can you

27:53

talk about some of your favorite films

27:56

of late or any nominees that you're kind

27:58

of rooting for? I

28:00

really like Perfect Days, which is

28:02

the foreign language, or

28:06

is it foreign film, nominee

28:08

from Japan, then

28:11

Fenders hit, directed, and

28:13

it's just such a

28:15

beautiful, quiet, but

28:17

beautiful film. That

28:20

is one that really stood

28:22

out for me. You

28:25

know, I did like the popular

28:27

ones, like Barbie and Oppenheimer, and I'm

28:29

sure Oppenheimer's gonna take away a lot

28:31

of awards, which

28:34

that's fine too. I

28:38

mean, I did enjoy watching them.

28:41

Okay, I'm gonna be candid

28:44

and admit that I have seen

28:46

neither, which I'm sure

28:48

is abhorrent

28:50

to listeners, but yes,

28:52

sadly, I haven't seen

28:54

either. So I guess I need to

28:57

quickly brush up. Yeah, I

29:00

mean, I haven't watched

29:02

all the nominations either,

29:06

but yeah, those I

29:09

actually went to see at a theater, so

29:12

I guess that's why they kind of, I

29:14

remember them. There

29:17

are other films that

29:20

were interesting, that were, again,

29:23

smaller films, but

29:25

the title of one is, oh, I think it

29:27

was called American Fiction. Oh,

29:29

yeah, right, right, yeah, that was great. So that's about

29:33

writing. So I did

29:35

really enjoy watching that one

29:37

as well. Very cool. Well,

29:40

I definitely wanna check out Perfect Days. I'm

29:42

a big fan of VIM vendors from

29:45

way back. Of course, they make you watch

29:47

VIM vendors if you go to

29:50

film school, which I didn't, but

29:52

I was jealous when I took film courses,

29:55

as electives, and I loved VIM

29:57

vendors early stuff, but yeah, American

29:59

Fiction. looks amazing and so that might be

30:02

next on my list for sure.

30:05

Iris, thank you so much for taking the time to

30:07

do this again. Of course we wish

30:09

you the best of luck. I'd love

30:11

to get your final thoughts on just

30:13

keeping those writing dreams alive before we

30:16

wrap here and of course I will point

30:19

at Village in the Dark,

30:21

the sequel of course to

30:23

your very well-received

30:25

sitting under one roof,

30:28

these claustrophobic, atmospheric novels

30:31

of yours. But yeah, we look forward to whatever comes

30:33

next so you have to come back and wrap with

30:35

us again. Thank you.

30:37

Yeah, for Village in the Dark,

30:40

if you read City under One

30:42

Roof and you liked some

30:44

of the side characters, I bring back a

30:47

couple in a big way and yeah,

30:49

the suggestions for my next book is

30:51

like, oh how about bringing

30:53

out the other characters because you know I

30:56

do change my voices in

30:58

each book. Each book has three points

31:01

of view and so other

31:03

than the protagonist I have

31:06

two different points

31:08

of view in the second book

31:10

so hopefully you'll pick that up

31:12

and yeah, I'm

31:15

very excited about it

31:17

coming out and the reactions that I've gotten

31:19

so far. Awesome, yeah.

31:21

Again, congrats and yeah, I don't know,

31:24

just maybe your final thought to

31:26

your fellow Scrubs, your final advice

31:28

on just keeping the dream alive. Yeah, yeah,

31:30

like as I've mentioned, I've done

31:33

a lot of

31:35

different media and so

31:37

I've talked before about pivoting

31:40

your career. So if,

31:42

so for instance in screenwriting when

31:44

I came across kind of a

31:47

block of being pigeonholed in

31:49

this sort of Asian historical space

31:51

which is unfortunately very

31:54

hard to produce, you can

31:58

try pivoting and so I pivoted to books

32:00

and now I can write contemporary

32:02

mysteries and I've

32:04

even, you know, I've written a musical

32:06

stage play that was a fantasy. So

32:09

you know, it takes a lot of

32:11

hard work and a little mindset change,

32:14

but if you want

32:16

your creative juices flowing, sometimes

32:19

you can pivot and you can try

32:22

a different form, a different

32:24

media outlet. Different mediums,

32:26

definitely. Great advice. And

32:28

we thank you for your time, your words, your wisdom

32:30

and yeah, we hope you come back

32:32

in the future and tell us about all of

32:34

your latest. Thank

32:36

you. Thank you so much for

32:42

having me. Thanks so much for joining us for this

32:44

file. And if you're a fan

32:46

of the show, simply head over to writerfile.fm

32:48

for more. Writerfile.fm.