ScreenCrush: The Podcast! - CLAUDIA GRAY Talks Writing Leia and Star Wars: High Republic - Crossover Universe Podcast

Episode Date: July 27, 2025

Novelist Claudia Gray talks to ScreenCrush about her career, writing Star Wars, and we meet her dog. This was a good day.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hold on, Doug must meet. Ay! Oh, that is little Doug. The meeting of the minds. Here we go. My little guy. Aw. Hey, welcome back ScreenCrush.

Welcome to the crossover year. I'm Doug. I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, and I'm your host, Hey, welcome back ScreenCrush. Welcome to the Crossover Universe podcast. I am here with my co-host, Heather Antos. And I'm here with my co-host, Ryan Airy.

How the heck are you, Ryan? I'm okay. I'm really nervous about today's interview because, you know, when you gave me a list of people who we could bring on later I was like, oh and you said that when I thought ah this person I'm I don't know what I'll do because she is one of my all-time favorite Star Wars author She wrote my favorite Star Wars well outside of the the Thrawn trilogy my favorite Star Wars novel So I'm really excited to talk to Claudia Grey later. That's gonna be great. Yeah, I

agree, I mean Claudia wrote my favorite Star Wars novel Outside of Throne as well, and we have two different favorites, so I'm really excited to get into that. Yeah, and I have not read, I think, your favorite. I'm just excited to talk to her. Like, also, she's a prolific author, she's written so many other books

that I haven't had a chance to read, I'm excited to learn about them. But yeah, you asked how I'm doing, the answer is stressed. Again, I don't know when this is going up, but like right now it seems like everything's happening at once. We've got Superman, we've got Fantastic Four, we've got Comic-Con, we have the Smurfs coming out, which got me thinking about the Smurfs.

I might talk about that later on during Hear Me Out. Yeah, I got a strong Smurf take for all you Smurfing Smurfs out there. Is it about Smurfette? Is it about the new Rihanna song? A little bit of, no, I haven't heard the new Rihanna song. I had no idea. What's a Rihanna again? I'm not sure.

Oh my gosh, Ryan. Not to know, oh, the woman who did the Emperor Palpatine thing at the Super Bowl. Yes, that one. That's her. I know who you're talking about. That's how I am. I mean, everything else is pretty great. Doug's good, Doug couldn't be here right now.

He's off doing manager stuff. How are you? What's new with you? I mean, everything else is pretty great. Doug's good. Doug couldn't be here right now. He's off doing manager stuff. How are you? What's new with you? I mean, just continuing the prep for San Diego Comic-Con, you know. It's funny. Last month, if you asked me, I thought it was going to be the most relaxed and chill Comic-Con I ever had.

Joke's on me. I now have wall-to-wall panel schedules and meetings. I just found out that Middle Earth Enterprises is having a pop-up activation of a real-life prancing pony. Oh my God, really? Yes, and they're building it. I'm so excited for this.

They're building it so that people are like hobbit sized. Oh, that is so cool. Isn't that the coolest thing? I'm so pumped and their booth is really, really close to the IDW booth. So I'm gonna be able to hang out there all day long. I can't wait. So excited.

If they're selling alcohol, that would make handling Comic-Con a whole lot easier. There it would. There it would too. You know, right now it's been so busy. I haven't had a chance to watch much. Normally like I've got things I'm, but you know one thing I kind of have my shows

that I watch at the gym and my shows that I watch and I'm doing dishes that are basically like I'm getting caught up on them or my wife doesn't want to watch the waiter on. So I've been rewatching lower decks. Oh fun. That show absolutely gets me every time. And the first time I saw it,

I hadn't seen like all of Voy it, I hadn't seen like Olive Voyager and I hadn't seen Enterprise. So there's all these other jokes and references. I think the show works on two different levels. So I've been pretty excited about getting through that. That show has to be a treat for an Easter egg fan because there's so many layers. There's so many layers to that show.

Well, okay, so like in the first season, and at the last episode, Ryker has this joke about, oh yeah, I was just on the holodeck at the first Enterprise, Ryker, Archer and those guys. But I hadn't seen the finale of Enterprise, so I didn't actually get the joke, but I still thought it was hilarious. Like that's how great that show is.

So if any of you out there, for instance, like Rick and Morty, and you're kind of wanting to get into Star Trek, it's a pretty fun entryway into it. That's a video I'm gonna make too, how to get into Star Trek, I'm pretty excited about. Lower Decks is definitely one of the best entry levels. That and Strangereal Worlds, if you wanna get into the live action stuff.

But like Lower Decks, yes, there's a lot of layered comedy that's Easter eggs for the show, but like it's just a fun, crazy, zany show that if you like, you know like adult animation or anything like that, highly, highly recommend, super fun. Have you been able to watch anything lately or are you too busy? What do I watch?

I have been, oh, this is, so I love trashy reality television, that's how I relax. No shade. And the newest season of Bachelor in Paradise just started and I am pumped. I saw that, yeah. We were watching that the other day. I was half watching it.

I was on my phone playing Solitaire. I like the Traders. If you're gonna talk trash reality TV. I love Traders, yes. And have you watched UK Traders? I haven't. Tyler and I have that like plan, I think actually to start this weekend.

I've heard it's extra trashy. Well, we have like friends we watch it with. So like I haven't been through the whole season. But what I like about UK Traders is, like, Traders Works, people thought they were coming here to talk for us to hear geek stuff while we're talking reality TV. The Traders is fun because it's a mashup

of all these different, it's like the Avengers for reality shows, right? UK Traders is just normal people. Oh. So, it's more about the game. And what frustrates me about Traders is people are always like, I can't believe you would lie to me. That's what the game is. The game is mafia, but with like people with plastic surgery.

So anyways, that's sort of our go-to. Like, I don't want to think right now, put that on. I tried watching Shark Tank last night. I can't stand that show, man. Like millionaires judging poor people for entertainment, it's the Hunger Games. That's one of my travel shows, because it's always...

Shark Tank is on... For Shark Tank and Forensic Files, you can find on anywhere, any hotel at any time. And Family Guy. And Family Guy, yeah. And so whenever I'm traveling for Comic-Con and I'm finishing commissions in the hotel or just zoning out and needing room service,

it's always Shark Tank or Forensic Files. I wanna see just one person going to Shark Tank who's not selling a product, who's there with just an investment opportunity and everything they ask is about really intricate banking terms. Just explain taxes. Just one person.

Just explain write-offs to me. Yeah, exactly. Just like, oh yeah, so what's the APR? And like, just go through all of that stuff. APR is the only business term I know. But yeah, that's life. That's life right now. It's great.

I think next month we're gonna be like that meme of John Travolta looking around, looking for Uma Thurman's voice in Pulp Fiction. But right now we are eating good. I can't wait for you to see Superman. I wanna talk to you about it. We can talk about it tomorrow. I mean, I'm seeing it tonight, so very excited.

But- Oh, I already have something tomorrow and I moved it twice. Sorry, I can't talk to you about it then. Ah, damn. Well, should we cut to our guest? Should we bring her on? Oh, please.

I've been struggling to feel banter before I get to actually meet this woman. I am so excited. Who do we have? Tell us who our guest is. So today is the incomparable Claudia Gray. She is the author of the Mr. Darcy and Miss Tony mystery series, which began with the murder of Mr. Wickham.

Love that we killed Mr. Wickham. Claudia is also the writer of multiple young adult novels, including the Evernight series, the Firebird trilogy, and the Constellation trilogy. In addition, she is probably most known for on this channel for writing several Star Wars novels, as including Lost Stars, Bloodline, and of course, being one of the inaugural architects of the High Republic era. Claudia, how the heck are you? I am super psyched because I'm getting to meet Ryan,

I briefly got to meet Doug, my husband and I are huge ScreenCrush fans. Now, we have a Doug Christmas ornament that goes on the tree every December. This is incredibly exciting. Amazing. We're so thrilled to have you here. When you were one of the first guests I suggested we should bring on when we started talking

about doing this podcast, because I knew how much of a fan of the channel you are. So it's, and now the layers of Easter eggs will continue to develop. Whenever Heather told me you had a Doug ornament on your Christmas tree, that was one of those like, I've been, I'm not gonna name drop, but like a few celebrities have like reached out through Twitter and stuff,

like I really love your channel. And I'm always like, oh, thank you. That's incredibly strange. But when she told me that, that's when I was like, no, lies. Why are you lying? That means a lot that you have little Dougie on your tree. I mean, literally, like the last thing

I think we got super crazy into was the penguin. And after every episode was over, we would talk for about 10 minutes like, oh, that was so great. It was like, is the screen crush up? Yeah. We got those up pretty fast. That one, I was, man, that show really took us by surprise.

We thought, yeah, we'll cover it. It's Batman. We really love the movie. And I was actually traveling when the first episode came out. So I said to Colton, hey, do you want to cover the show? And then he got to cover it. After that, I was so jealous. It was so great. Yeah, what a sleeper hit that show was.

I mean, I knew we were in for something good when Colin Farrell signed on to do a whole miniseries, because that man's filmography choices are just, they're all supreme. God, what a gift that show was. I want more in that universe. Give me more. Matt Reeves, they're all supreme. God, what a gift that show was. I want more in that universe. Give me more. Matt Reeves, we're all waiting. When it came to The Batman, I didn't see it in theaters

and I didn't feel much initial urgency to go see it because I was like, well, this looks pretty grimdark. And I'm part of the cultural thing that is sort of going, maybe we've had enough grimdark, but one evening, it's relatively late, my husband and I were like, let's just start it. Yeah. You know?

And then at one point, you know, we were like, okay, if we watch this to the end, we're gonna be up until 2 a.m. And we are watching it to the end. Yeah. It's blowing away. Because it is grimdark, but it's intelligent Grimdark that earns the right to tell its story. And then at the end, it turns and becomes this

commentary on Grimdark, which I thought was incredible. Yeah. No, it truly... That is the peak live action Batman film to me. Like just truly. Really? It's so good. Yeah, I just. I totally agree. It makes them a,

cause it's a detective movie first. Like it doesn't have to be Batman. You can remove the costume, remove the cape. And it's just a good detective movie, which is really cool. I mean, I love the Dark Knight, but I would argue that is a better Joker movie than it is a Batman movie. I agree.

I agree with that. Well, I think a lot of Batman movies struggle with that, right? Even going back to Tim Burton, the villains always, you know, because he has such a great rogues gallery and Batman as a character is pretty static. So no wonder the villains always overshadow him. But Claudia, you're right. Like in that movie, Bruce has an arc. He doesn't have an arc in most of these movies.

But in this one, he has to learn to stand in the light and be a commentary on Grimdark. I love that. Well, speaking of DC Universe, I mean, the talk on everyone right now is Superman. I hear he's got a film coming out soon. Will be out by the time this comes out. And you've also got to play a little bit in that universe with your graphic novel series, The House of El,

which is super cool. You know, you got to invent an entirely new cast of characters inside the mythos of Krypton. Can you tell us a little bit about that process? Like how much free reign? Did DC have any direction for you on that? Just to begin with this, like it is absolutely bonkers that my first comic ever was writing Superman for DC. You know, I'm always like, no pressure, no stakes, right? It's like we can give it a tricycle and told to win the Tour de France. You had, oh, like, go for it.

And they were great though. They provided some guidance, but they also said, we want this to exist in its own universe. You're free to nod to or take from whatever you want, but we're not trying to fit this into a continuity. Yeah. So you get to create your Krypton, which was fantastic. That's so good.

I'm one of the kids, I'm dating myself here, but I was eight the year that Superman, the original movie came out, which was both a great moment, even as a young child to sort of understand like, oh wait, boys could grow up to be this maybe? That's interesting. But also it just really,

I mean, I'd just been minted a nerd because of Star Wars the previous year. And this, it blew me away. I mean, if there was one movie, if I had to try to quote an entire movie, like for a million dollars or to save my life, Superman the movie is the closest I could come, I think. You know, that is my favorite superhero movie too.

It's beautiful. I talk about it all the time. I mean, to be the first real superhero movie in the way that we look at them now. That movie is so confident. It doesn't show you Superman for an hour. They trust you. They trust you to go with this crazy thing

and let the story have its weight and its emotion. And I still feel like you feel his love of Kansas and home so much more in that first movie. No, they really make any place else is captured. I was going to say they really make you invest in the character in the world before they they wow you, right? They give you so much room to build. And I think that is something I mean, we've talked about this a little bit on the channel, Ryan, that some of the more current superhero films, they just want to get to the cape and tights and the big punches and all that way too soon that they don't give us anything to really sink our teeth into. And also I will get to talking about my books in a minute, but now I have to nerd speak. No, no, no. This is a podcast now. We're just talking about my books in a minute, but now I have to nerd speak.

No, no, no, this is a podcast now. We're just talking about Super. We're talking about Richard Donah. That bit of nerd speak until the very end. Ooh. Yes. Okay. All right.

But yes, so I got to create the script one, but from the time I'd seen it, when I was a child, even as a child, it was like, how can they be this advanced, this scientifically sophisticated, have all this technology and not know the world's gonna blow up? Yeah.

And unfortunately, as an adult, I'm now like, oh, I see how. They knew, they just didn't care. It was just out of sight, out of mind. Yeah. But I was like, okay, I want to build a Krypton where we understand why they don't see it, why they can't see it.

And that is what creates the very specific Krypton of House of El. Yeah. I mean, there's a really strong dystopian feel to those novels. It feels almost like Hungry Hymns means Man of Steel in a cool way, but for the YA audience. Was that intentional? And do you think there's something that YA dystopia can bring new nuance out of superhero storytelling? Because we haven't really got a lot of that.

It was interesting to play with the young adult aspect of it. Because you have Superboy with Superman, but it always sort of feels like this is a step before we get to Superman. And I wanted, I thought it was very good to have younger people facing this. Because these characters, they're literally having everything stolen from them. And I do think some of the excuses and political realities, et cetera, that sink

in adulthood, that sink in in adulthood, when you're young, you don't buy it. Your bullshit meter is very, very sensitive at that point in time. In fact, it's probably going off a little too much, but I wanted to dig into that and let the, because it felt like the young people there, that was a good viewpoint to look at what was happening and to really question the setup that most of society

is not questioning at all. And then I also want to give a special shout out to your collaborator on that project, Eric Zawadzki, who I love Eric. I've got to work with him on a creator-owned comic series called Time Before Time. Oh, great. There's like a real elegance to his designs,

like a pre-apocalyptic art deco. Yeah, I felt so guilty because, again, I was learning to write comics as I did this. And so it was well into the second book before I was like, I've created a Krypton that is insanely difficult to draw with all these layers and this and that. But Eric nailed it. He absolutely nailed it.

I was going to ask, like like how much of that was, you know, in the script versus just Eric bringing, you know, his own flair. I have to admit that the really complicated stuff, a lot of that came from me, but was rendered beautiful and visually comprehensible by Eric, which I'm not convinced every artist out there would have been able to do. Yeah. Or any artist possibly. It was a lot.

I regret so much. Poor Eric. No, I know. You guys killed it. I mean, but that has to be such a learning curve, right? As someone who writes primarily in novels where you get to just use a million words to describe all the beautiful things. Unlimited budget.

Unlimited budget. And you know, it's easy to write a thousand soldiers on a thousand horses with a thousand, you know, spears and not think twice about it. You know, has that, has going from novels to comics and then back to novels, has comics writing informed your novels writing in any way? Some of the biggest things that it taught me were,

one, sometimes I'm using too much dialogue. Although lately I've been writing the Jane Austen mysteries where you do need to lean on dialogue. That's that voice. But it's like, okay, I don't need to spell this out this much. And it also, I mean, you know, going into working on comics, you know, well, you tell the story visually, you tell it with pictures, but it's one thing to know this and have this information, and it is another for your creative imagination to begin generating story in that way. And that began while I was working on these books.

It was like, oh, okay, I get it better now. And I feel like that has been incredibly helpful because a strong visual setup, even if you're describing it for somebody instead of showing them, is really powerful and has a place anywhere stories are told. Well, speaking of your Jane Austen world, murder mysteries, all of this fun stuff,

have to ask first and foremost, in your opinion, what is the definitive best live action adaptation of Pride and Prejudice? That's a kick-ass question. I don't even think it's difficult. I think it's absolutely the 1995 with Colin Firth. The 2005 is very romantic, and there are things about it I enjoy a lot.

But they make Darcy's problem is not that he's proud. It's that he's socially awkward. And it's not socially awkward and prejudice. That is not the story. You fundamentally change the story in a way. And like, it's still telling the story that I think is good. But when you're talking about an adaptation,

the best adaptation is the one that does tell that original story. And the 1995 version does that so brilliantly. And you also get more of it. Yeah, you do. You get a little bit more. Although I think the actual best Austin adaptation of all time, it's also from 1995, which

was a good year for these things, but is that year's persuasion. I've not seen that one. Really? In Sharon Hines. It's a beautiful, beautiful movie. So you said that part of the inspiration for your Jane Austen murder mystery stories

is you read a different story where they should have killed Mr. Wickham. Yes. And I guess you took that right in your own hands. What is it about Mr. Wickham that made you want to murder him? I mean, he's the worst. He's the worst.

He's the worst. I mean, I know that a lot of people have picked that book up, they just see the name and they're like, finally somebody's killed him. I mean, he's, not only is he manipulative, not only does he disregard the safety and wellbeing of all those around him? He has a penchant for seducing 15-year-old girls, which, you know, look askance at. He has very few redeeming

characteristics other than the ability to sort of be kind of charming when making small talk, which takes him a long way, unfortunately. But yeah, it was very satisfying to finally get to do that because also I was just like, so many people could want to kill him. I can create a long suspect list on this. I love that. So, I mean, in your career, you know, even though this is your own adaptation,

your own version of these characters, your own world, you're still dealing with beloved characters who have lived on in various formats, which is similar to working with the world of Krypton, similar to working with the world of Star Wars, X-Files, which we'll get to a little bit. How did you, how do you, because you're still writing these, like, how do you navigate honoring Austin's original voices while completely changing the tone and genre

of this world? That was honestly the biggest challenge of the first book was finding the tone that would still feel Austin-esque, but be believable for a cozy mystery. You know, there are, we have slightly different values of what's realistic to happen in these scenarios. You know, if you're reading cozy mysteries, the idea that these quiet English towns have a murder rate that would stagger and panic anyone.

You know, you sort of roll with this, but Jane Austen was very rooted in things that could happen and did happen. Even the more dramatic events in her books are all events that could and did occur. So that was the hardest thing was sort of finding a voice that would hit that. And it's great because, I mean,

you have these wonderful characters who even more than 200 years later remain funny, which again, like, there's stuff from 40 years ago that isn't funny anymore. This stuff is still funny. The characters are really drawn in a way that lets you get in there and understand them and play with them. And I always try to draw on the faults they have in the original books are the faults and flaws that lead them into trouble. Because all your suspects have a problem. All of them are telling a lie.

The question is, who's telling the lie about the murder? That really helps to sort of root it in what we already know are their weak points. And of course, in the original books, they come to recognize these weak points, but I definitely think Austin was a wise enough student of human nature to know we don't really get over our flaws, we just get better at handling them.

Masking them, yeah. Yeah, but there will always be something that can set you off. Yeah. Always, the right circumstance. And so it's fun going, okay, what would it take in the murder of Mr. Wickham? What does it take for Mr. Darcy

to shut down emotionally again? Yeah. You know, what could lead Mr. Knightley's brother to make this bad decision, et cetera? So hopefully that helps. Tie it back to the originals just enough that people are able to follow it and have fun. Well and speaking of fun, I saw you recently got to go to the Jane Austen Foundation in England and practice some quill work with our mutual friend, Cavan Scott. But also there, I saw you visited the Mary Shelley's Frankenstein Museum.

Is that possibly for some upcoming research for something? No, not at this time. I want a Claudia Gray Frankenstein, Mary Shelley murder mystery. I actually tried really hard to do a sort of Frankenstein thing back in the early heyday of young adult books, but I could never quite get the idea in order. So I'm never gonna say never,

some things like this could come up, but it wasn't immediate. It was more that, Kevin said, if he came to the Jane Austen Center with me, I was then going to the House of Frankenstein with him. And they are literally about two doors apart. And that's in London? It's in Bath.

Oh, in Bath. Okay, I gotta go. It's great. Yeah, it looked really cool. I mean, look, one day we'll get Claudia Grace Lee's in Frankenstein, that's all I gotta say. Well, before we go to Star Wars, I do wanna talk a little bit also about,

I know Ryan's like, get through all the other fandom stuff. No, no, no, I'm enjoying, I'm not as familiar with this other work. So this is great, it's given me a reading list. I keep stopping to fill out my goodreads if you guys are going through, so please. Well, speaking of fandoms,

I happen to know that you are one of the biggest Mulder and Scully fans out there. And you also just so happened to get to write a YA prequel novel. Oh, no? Was it not? Whoa, it's not a YA prequel novel. No, it is adult novel. Oh, it's adult. Okay.

How adult are we talking here? Because when they were three, I've seen some pretty adult Mulder and Scully fiction. Not as adult as my first Mulder and Scully on the internet back in the day. But no, it takes place actually after the last two televised seasons. Oh, okay.

Yeah. Oh, wow. Mulder and Scully are older and they've been through all these experiences. And the idea was sort of to give a reset where you could tell X-Files stories from. So was this before the movie reboot or after? After, after. This was after that as well, so this is a brand new. Yeah, the last two televised seasons were a very mixed bag.

The myth arc had gotten very convoluted and I can tell you that because literally I would be so confused like what happened with whatever and I actually got to work with Chris Carter on this book. I had emailed him and he said, I'm sorry what happened with whatever? He's like, I don't know. He was sort of like yeah it's a dense at this point. So I got to work on that, but also catch up with Mulder and Scully where they were at that place. And it was really, really fulfilling to get to do

because the very first fiction I ever wrote was extraordinarily mediocre, X-Files fan fiction. But, you know, it got me started. And it was wonderful to get to revisit that and tell a story with those characters and do weird, creepy things. It is so incredibly sweet, though, to imagine you, amateur writer, saying,

I just love this show so much. I want to get out my thoughts for this. And then to imagine, if you could have told that person back then, hey, guess what? You know, what would her reaction have been like? Yeah, I always want to go back in time and be like, everything you thought was wasted time was career preparation.

Everything you think is career preparation was wasted time. You're going to be paying off that law degree a whole lot longer than you're going to use it. Oh, no. But that's something, you're gonna be paying off that law degree a whole lot longer than you're gonna use it. Oh no. But that's something, you know, I talk about a lot of times, you know, to people who are aspiring writers or artists

or filmmakers or whatever. We're all fans too, that get to work on this stuff. You know, our jobs are literally those high school lunches where you sit around and say, wouldn't it be cool if, you know, Scolder and Mulley did X, Y, and Z. And we just turned that into a profession. And so, you know, I've said this about your work before,

but your fandom and love of these worlds and these characters shines through in a way in your work that I think most authors struggle to capture. Um, when I read Lost Stars for the first time, and we'll get to Star Wars now, when I read Lost Stars, which was one of the first waves of the new novels that, you know, when Disney bought the brand, and it read like fan fiction, the new novels that, you know, when Disney bought the brand

and it read like fan fiction, but in the very, very best way. You're creating these brand new characters that are having their own story and lives develop in this world that we're so familiar with. And it felt so lived in and so real, but it was additive and it didn't feel like you're playing with toys. It felt like you were really crafting something new within this

world and it's great. It's just really great. I mean, first of all, thank you. But second of all, yeah, I do think one of the things that writing fanfic taught me was like really asking yourself, okay what is this world like for people who are in it? Mm-hmm. Because I remember early on with Lost Stars I had something about Thame going to his family's hangar and one of the people who'd read that line was like excuse me you know hangars have rules and regulations and you have to do flight plans. I was like, not in Star Wars if you don't,

they're just like having a garage. You know, you would be completely ordinary there. And just thinking about things in that way. And of course, you know, ever since I was seven, I'd been thinking, you know, what would it be like to be there? So it was great, great fun to get to do. How much direction did you have with Lost Stars?

I know you've mentioned before that Lucasfilm said, you know, we want to follow these two friends. That was honestly almost it. Really? Yeah, they were like, we want two childhood friends who wind up on opposite sides of that war from the original trilogy. And that was it? Well, they were like, we want an angry guy

who joins the empire and this idealistic girl who joins the rebellion. And I was like, let me switch it. I want the idealistic girl in the rebellion and the angry, I mean, in the empire and the angry guy in the rebellion. And they said, oh, hey. That's such a brilliant decision.

Yeah, I mean, who criticizes the state? Who believes in the state? So that was really fun. Just asking, what is somebody who's not evil in the empire thinking? What are they being told? Well, that was an interesting time to jump into writing Star Wars, because that's

when Disney reorganized their canon, and it became very much like everything has to connect to all of this other media, whereas with the EU, it was a fairly open book. There were times when they were doing like the Yu-Shin-Vong and things like that. No, I always get that wrong, but in general, if you wanted to write a Han Solo story, you could,

but now it was tied into this very specific era that was then gonna go into The Force Awakens. What kind of guidelines did you have to connect it to canon or what were you not allowed to do? That was actually another thing I learned from writing fan fiction. In some ways, it's much easier to write in a closed canon, which is what Star Wars effectively was

the majority of that time, versus writing an open canon where anything can change at any point. And now writing Star Wars is writing that. And I lost stars was still a pretty clean field because it was original characters, it was my own planet that I made up and sneakily named after Star Trek. That's the nerdiest hobby I think you can have is sneaking Star Trek references into Star Wars films. Oh, and vice versa.

And vice versa. We do it too. Well, I sneaked a Star Wars reference into House of L. So I guess if at some point I need to work some Superman into Star Trek to complete the story. We'll talk, we'll talk, we'll make it happen. But yeah, all I had to do in Lost Stars was work with the original trilogy, which I am immensely familiar with, of course,

like most of us. I did re-watch it, but it was for things that I'd never thought to ask myself. You know, like what shape are the windows on a Star Destroyer? I never thought about it while watching it. Or what's it like down in those data pits on the bridge of a Star Destroyer?

You know, because we're always looking at Vader or whoever else is up there, but Cyana, she's down in the pit. So I needed to watch and just look at that, which was fun to do. So yeah, with Lost Stars, it was very, very free. It had to be a little bit more conscious sense. I've learned to ask upfront. I ask a lot of questions, you know, like,

can I have the huts? Can I have a little bit of the huts? Or a lot of the huts. Can I go to this planet? Can I do this? And I kind of get the green flag or the red flag. And I don't really even dig deeply into the story until I kind of know.

No, what you can't, yeah. This area is free for me. I mean, it's their job in some ways to slice that deli meat as thin as it can be, but it's my job to make the best sandwich. So I'm in there getting as much as I can get, as much story as I can put in. Now, at that time, I was also working on the Star Wars comics,

and it was a very exciting time to be working on Star Wars canon, you know? Force Awakens hadn't quite come out yet. You know, we're all just super, super hyped. But as we all know, when working on licensed IP, Force Awakens hadn't quite come out yet. We're all just super, super hyped. But as we all know, when working on licensed IP, especially active licensed IP, that is a connected continuity,

there's always the risk and always the time of, oh, hey, they changed this line in the script. They added this character. They changed this character. This planet is no longer the planet that we're going to. Did you ever run into any of that on some of the earlier novels? I know we get to that later on, but like with Lost Stars,

did anything with the sequel trilogy affect it? Not really. The only thing with Lost Stars was at one point, right after the first Death Star is blown up, I had Darth Vader's flagship Star Destroyer doing something. And they just came back and they said, it's not there. Yeah. It's like, it's a pretend ship in our minds.

And they're like, yeah, and it has somewhere else to be. And that was the first time I'd been like, oh, OK. But then I got to add one of my actual favorite scenes in the book, which came from the thing that I had thought about even as a little kid, which is because those Thai fighters do not have hyperspace capacity, somebody had to go pick Vader up.

Yeah. Like a kid at school whose parents couldn't get out of meetings. Gotta. Right. Vader was just stuck there until somebody went to get him. Like a kid at school whose parents couldn't get out of meetings. Vader was just stuck there until somebody went to get him. So I got to go get him, which worked much better in the end. I think you were also the first depiction of the Battle of Jakku

in that book, if I remember right. Because that was released before Force Away. It was definitely before the final Aftermath novel, which actually is about the battle of Jakku. So that's pretty cool. That's a feather in your cap. That was cool. And actually the really great thing,

the ending was originally a little bit different, or rather the big climax of the ending. And they were like, hey, if you change the timing just a little bit and have it take place on this planet Jakku, it will tie into the Force Awakens, about which I knew nothing in advance, by the way. Nothing.

So I was like, okay, I'll do that. And I feel like I'm giving a lot of spoilers for Lost Stars here, but one thing I did was ram a Star Destroyer into the ground. Amazing. And literally the day I mailed that off, they came out with that second trailer that begins into the ground. Amazing. And literally the day I nailed that off, they came out with that second trailer

that begins with the John Williams music. And you see the Star Destroyer. And right riding past the Star Destroyer. That was literally my greatest fan moment ever. I was just like, I crashed that ship. That is incredible. Yes. Well, like you said, you were seven years old

when you saw Star Wars. So you, like the rest of us, absolutely grew up with it. And I also, we talked about Claudia writing fan fiction earlier. I can only imagine what it was like for you to go to the theater at seven years old and see this absolute badass space princess rebel

grab a blaster, get in the chute, fly boy, take control. Not something you ever got to see women do in 70s sci-fi movies. And I think personally, I think you're one of the defining voices of Princess Leia, because in the movies, we see Leia do things, you never get inside a character's head

like you do in the novels, and I frequently praise your novel bloodline. Oh, thank you. I see it sometimes on screen crush and get very psyched. Oh man, well, it also, it's a good talk about because it has that cool visual that they added to the book, the poster with like Leia. But if you haven't read Bloodline,

it's essentially about five, six years before Force Awakens. Roughly, yeah. And it's about how Leia, what happened to the Republic, the new Republic, what happened to the Senate? Why did it fall apart? Why did Leia leave? You know, things I wish had been in the movies. Yes.

But it's also interesting because you got to do Leia, Princess of Alderaan that shows how she entered the rebellion. So, I mean, I guess I just want to hear you talk about Leia and what she means to you and what it was like to create this bookend for her. Yes, she was a heroine from my childhood. I remember I wanted that Princess Leia doll so badly,

so badly, I could not stand it. And they didn't have a bunch of the toys out for Christmas 77, it was Christmas 78. Yeah, because they didn't know it was gonna be a hit. Well, you also got to pre-order toys, right? Like with like the block series, you got to pre- the cardboard box or whatever. Yeah, we did not do that.

Yeah, my brother and I were not quite old enough for pre-ordering, but the minute those things started to show up in stores, you know, we just began collecting them. And that was one of the things that we would play together. We tended to have very different ideas of what was fun, except Star Wars, which we liked very much together. That's sweet.

Yeah. Actual true story, we had one of the little just rebel guys, you know, nameless Rebel 47 or whatever it was. And the place where I grew up, we were right by a river, Nameless Rebel 47 or whatever it was. And the place where I grew up, we were right by a river, by which I mean it was backyard river. And one time there was gonna be flooding and they came and they sandbagged everything.

But when they were done, they left this huge pile of sand on the vacant lot. You had Tatooine. Yes, we did. And so we're out there playing and Tatooine, et cetera. We did that a ton. And again, that sand pile was nowhere. It slowly, you know, we grow up, we move out.

That sand pile erodes over literal decades. And I think it was literally something like 25 years later, somebody was doing something in a vacant lot and they came and knocked on my parents' door. They had found the little rebel. He had been buried all that time. And it was like, did this belong to you? And they were like, yeah, we think it did.

So it was a long tour of duty for that little guy. Did he know the war was over when he was pulled out? Is he like, no, we won, it's okay. Get that twice in therapy. Yes. So for you, what makes Leia, I had such a basic question, what makes her fun to write?

Like, what do you identify with in her? Well, I mean, she's great because she's funny. She's got a little bit of Carrie Fisher's authentic bite to her. And in the novel, I got to lean into that a little bit more, not much, but a little bit of Carrie Fisher's authentic bite to her. And in the novel, I got to lean into that a little bit more, not much, but a little bit more. And that independence of spirit, you know, she's just so completely unbowed

by all these things that happen that could devastate things. And like one of my happiest things in Bloodline was sort of recasting the, they don't call it the Slave Leia bikini anymore, but the Jabba the Hutt bikini, getting to recast that as her being famous as the Hutt Slayer.

That's what she was wearing when she strangled this guy. And that's what that means to her and to many other beings in the Star Wars universe itself. And Carrie Fisher had said that too, that for her it wasn't about the bikini, is that she strangled a giant testicle while she was wearing the bikini. Yes.

Well, in Princess of Alderaan, you get to write a 16 year old Leia, right? This is a version of Leia that we've never got to see before in anything, you know? And Leia's always been like kind of, you know, headstrong, stubborn, a little bit angsty in her own way. But for her teenage years, what was the most important quality that you wanted to preserve from, classic layer that we all know and love. I mean, I thought she's still going to be really headstrong, in some ways more so, because she hasn't quite gained the maturity to know when to push and when not to push,

which she comes to very early in life, certainly much younger than me or most people I know, but at this point she doesn't yet. But the thing that was really important to me was making her very active from the beginning because sort of the standard fan explanation or I think it was even alluded to sort of in official things was like, oh, Bale brought her in. Her father brought her into the rebellion. And I always ask this at cons. I'm like, okay, you, parent, are engaged in something

that you feel strongly about, but you absolutely know if you are caught, you will be tortured and murdered immediately. Are you, A, in a big hurry to introduce your minor child to this or B, going to keep your kid as far out of it as you possibly can? And I felt like the second option was more likely for most parents. I wanted to give her the motivation to be like, my parents aren't quite telling me the truth about what they're doing.

Something is going on here. I can't rest until I know what it is. So that was the most important thing to me. It's an interesting juxtaposition too of seeing the Monmothma relationship with her family and that we just saw in Andor, right? Oh yeah, and I love that. I mean, I love Monmothma, I always have,

particularly back in 83 when she was like, the other girl, thank God. And the leader. Yeah, yeah, and the leader, the absolute boss. And side note, but I think one of the absolute miracles of Andor is they took that scene, they saw that Mon Mothma wore a chain and they created an entire planet culture from that.

That is beautiful. But yeah, I like that the Mon Mothma who showed up in the books still works with that one and possibly even better because I'm not gonna spoil the scene, but there is a scene in Princess of Alderaan that makes some reference to the idea that her marriage may not be the best. And we now know how true that really is.

That's incredible. Yeah. I don't even know how much they would have taken that into account because when they made Andor, I know Heather, I know it's a touchy subject, they did discard certain points of continuity or didn't consider them as much. So that's incredible that it's tied together just that tight. Oh, I don't think they took that from me. I think they came up with that on their own.

Well, you never know, they might have. Because like I said, they did pull a lot and have, they talked to Pablo Hidalgo and all these other people to find out what works in universe. So that's feather in your cap. You got to crash the Star Destroyer and ruin Mom Mosse's marriage. I'm literally like an Andor cultist.

I was at a party telling somebody like, if you ever wanna see it, like we could start watching it. And one of my friends was like, you have said that to every person I have seen the last year. And I was like, and I'm gonna keep saying it until some of them watch it with me. And some of them have, but-

And you can't see it enough, really. Yeah, and Andor is, I will accept Andor doing things that would bother the heck out of me in almost any other piece of Star Wars media because they executed it so wonderfully and so compellingly. It's like, yes, you get the right to move that planet around or whatever, like have at it.

I want to talk about High Republic. Okay. So this is something that I am, I love High Republic so much. You know how sometimes you have like a TV show you like so much, you don't rush through it? Just so you want to savor it. That's how I am with the High Republic so much. You know how sometimes you have like a TV show you like so much you don't rush through it? Just so you want to savor it. That's how I am with the High Republic.

Like I'm still like near the beginning of phase three. One thing I love so much, and it's what we talked about before about A Closed Canon, is how well designed and put together this era is spread across comics, YA novels and novels. And you were one of the original story people who got together to form that. What was that process like?

They brought the five of us to Skywalker Ranch, which first of all, what? Was that your first time getting to go? It was my first time getting to go. So cool. And it's awesome, just as you would hope. And it's awesome because it's actually designed to facilitate creativity.

You have to walk around through these different sort of landscapes to get from building to building because that was a great moment for idea generation. And we got to go into the library, which is amazing. And there are all these books and it's mythology or deep sea creatures, you know, the costumes of, I don't know, Japanese no theater, all these different things for inspiration.

And you'd be leafing through a book and you'd find this little, Ted'd be like, oh, somebody looked at this for the Phantom Menace, you know, which was incredible. Wow. My brain's exploding right now listening to this. Yeah, but our first meeting, our first conference, we literally were just talking about things

we'd liked in Star Wars and what we were interested in seeing in Star Wars and what we connected to. And then the second time, we got more into designing this era. And one of the first things that, at least that I added to it, actually came weirdly from writing the Star War, I mean, the Superman comics. Oh, interesting. Because they let you watch some classes and some talks and some things like that.

And I believe it was Grant Morrison who was talking about Superman being so casual and free with his body. This is a man with no fear. You know, he doesn't have any physical risk to him at any place at any time. He would be relaxed. he would do this. And so one of my first things is like, okay, the Jedi are more relaxed. Their place in the galaxy hasn't been questioned

for 980 generations. They're not threatened. The Sith, as far as they know, are absolutely gone. And so we thought, well, there's not gonna be one right way to be a Jedi in that era. And it isn't all centered on the main temple. There are other temples that have slightly different ways of doing things, or the idea that you could become

a way seeker, where you're like, maybe I need to leave the Jedi Order, but this is still the force that's leading me in a direction. And in that era, they're able to say, okay, you know, if and when the force calls you back, we will find you. And obviously by the time of the Phantom Menace, the Clone Wars, it's ossified a little bit. The Jedi Order has lost some of its mystical roots. It's a lot more hierarchical. You know, I mean, Ahsoka walks away from the Jedi

in the High Republic era, I don't think she would have, if she had felt the need to do that, it would have been free for her to return. There would have been a place for that. So that was probably- The Jedi had also adopted a military structure by that point too. And I've said this for a while.

The High Republic added more to the Star Wars canon than anything since the Phantom Menace. Oh wow, thank you. Yeah, everything you, no, it's true because like you said, you added all these different layers and dimensions, but continue please, I cut you off. I mean, but you know, we, we liked the idea of showing kind of that golden age because from 77 on,

when you heard Ben Kenobi say that they were the guardians of peace and justice for a thousand generations, you wanted to see that. You wanted to see it in action. And it's very easy to show, Yeah. You wanted to see that. You wanted to see it in action. And it's very easy to show, to create drama out of the dysfunction of something or the breakdown of something. This is natural conflict.

But that didn't mean that there was no way to create conflict and stakes and still portray what was a golden age, not a perfect age, and certainly terrible things are still happening that they have to deal with, but to see the order functioning well, to see the different ways that it could play out, to see the different kind of Jedi that were welcome then, that was something that I think we were all very psyched

about and that we thought a lot of potential readers would be interested in. Well, that was something, you know, in the early days of the Marvel run, like, Charles Soule, we pitched this Obi-Wan and Anakin series, and it was originally supposed to be its own ongoing thing, because there's, you know, 10 years in between Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones and, you know, 10 years in between Phantom Menace

and Attack of the Clones and, you know, for the movie era, right? Like, that was when the Jedi were still being Jedi. And like you said, you know, we've never got to really see that. We never really got to explore that part of the Jedi in continuity. And so it was really exciting when the High Republic came to be, and that was kind of one of the big motivations of that era. I am curious, though, because when the High Republic started, it was originally designed to be a publishing-only initiative.

And since then, we've seen it, you know, I don't think anyone could have imagined it being as successful as it was. We all hoped for it, but it truly took off in a way that we've not really seen happen in books. Daniel, Jose, Older and I both lived in New Orleans at that time. And I remember we were out at lunch one day going,

is anybody going gonna need this? We were concerned. The marketing was perfect too. I mean, the trailer and everything, we were so pumped about it. Yeah. Oh, I was just gonna say, what has it been like to see this world,

this little pocket corner universe, hundreds of years before any of the films take place, to see it pop up and be a major part of the Fallen, you know, the Jedi Survivor game, to be, you know, to get its own TV series that takes place in the era and the accolade, like, that's got to be wild. It is wild. You know, I mean, the extent, at least of my participation in that, was they were like, there's going to be a video game

and that's it, that's what we get to know. With the Acolyte, we did get to go to the premiere. Oh, fun. Oh, that's awesome. Which was fun and really enjoyed it and had a good time, but they would not let us in the big party. Oh. Yes, we did not.

You're kidding me. We did not rate. That sounds correct. But we actually, a friend of Charles' soul, it turns out, is a magician and he took us to the Magic Castle instead, which was super fun and a great time. And then last year at a con, I got to meet Manny Jacinto, who played Chimera. Oh, awesome. Of everything in the Acolyte, I really hope they Manny Jacinto, who played Chimera, which did very well. Of everything in the Acolyte, I really hope they'll go back and tell more about Chimera.

I thought he was great. I thought you were gonna say for a second that Charles Soule's magician friend snuck you into the party. Because he was the entertainment and he had some sort of revolving TARDIS or something. That would have been great if we burst out

of the Aztec tomb, no. But anyway, I was telling him, yeah, we didn't get to go to the party. And he said, you didn't miss much. And I said, we went to the Magic Castle instead. He was like, I would have wanted to go to the Magic Castle. So I believe we got the better part of that deal. But yeah, it is incredible.

And I do think we're gonna see more things taking place over a broader period of time. I mean, we know this because of the James Mangold movie, which is supposed to be so far back and is being written by Beau Willimon, who is one of my very favorite writers of Andor. Hold on. Doug must meet.

Oh, hello. That is little Doug. Is Doug around? Doug might not be around right now. That's okay. He's in the stock room. Doug has some business. Oh, actually, wait a minute.

Hold on. No, no, no. He's right there. One second. Let me just. Hold on. Let me just go down into the basement here. Just go down this way. And the meeting of the minds.

Here we go. My little guy. And as promised, as promised, he gets a treat. Okay, come here buddy. Yeah, she's hearing the T-R-E-A-T-W-O-L-D. Sorry about that. That's okay, she'll be fine. She gets her dinner in just a minute. All right, sorry.

This is the highlight of the podcast for some viewers. Yeah, oh yeah. We're always very excited about Doug. Good boy. Aw, buddy. Okay, we'll let him finish that and then we'll get back to the interview. Yes, we were talking about... that, and then we'll get back to the interview.

Yes, we were talking about... Oh, yeah, the broader time period of the Star Wars universe going forward, which definitely, I mean, one of the brilliant things about the original Star Wars was you felt like that was a world that had a history. Yeah. You sensed that.

And I like that apparently we're gonna be playing in a lot of different areas and eras, you know. I also really enjoyed Skeleton Crew. It was definitely kids, but delightful. And so I'm hoping we'll see a little bit more of this sort of thing. Maybe it's High Republic, maybe it's other things. You've got to play with some, you know, you've got to create a bunch of stuff for the Star Wars universe.

You've got to play with some of the biggest characters and biggest defining moments in the Star Wars universe. But is there a character or era that you've not got to touch that you are just dying to? I have already explained to the head of Star Wars publishing that if they go back and do some Knights of the Old Republic books, that there's a book about how Mission and Zalbar first team up and I am not the person to write it, there will be blood. Ooh. It is not okay.

And actually all the time when I'm asking what I can have in a book, I'm like, can I have HK 47? And the answer's always no. They told us no too. Yeah. Yeah. I really wanted him for Master and Apprentice. I just felt like he should be calling poor young Obi-Wan a meat bag. But anyway, this just proves that they have, they obviously have an HK 47 trilogy planned specifically following his murders. It could be kind of great though.

It could. Yeah. It really could. I'm under NDA, I'm not allowed to talk about it. Well on that note, Ryan, should we talk about some Hear Me Outs? Let's do Hear Me Out, let's do Hear Me Out. All right, so Smurf movie's coming up,

I saw a billboard for it and it got me thinking about the Smurfs and about how, and this is more of a theory than an opinion, but the Smurfs, I don't know how deep you guys aren't the lore, but Papa Smurf was the first Smurf, he created the other Smurfs. Smurfette was created by Gargamel, and then Papa Smurf did magic to turn her good.

My whole thing about the Smurfs that's weird is the Smurfs are asexual, right? They do not reproduce. But, and most of the other Smurfs treat Smurfette just like another Smurf, right? They don't care, except hefty and handy Smurf fight over her a lot. And I think, and this isn't as much a theory

as like an observation about this universe, I think it's because they are cast in traditional masculine roles, so they feel like they're supposed to chase after Smurfette. But to quote the Joker, it's like a dog chasing cars. I wouldn't know what to do if I got one. So that's why I think for them, it's more about the fighting.

And if anything, there's more sexual tension between those two than there would be between Smurfette. Like Ken, you know, asking to stay at Barbie's, and she's like, to do what? Exactly. He's like, I don't really know. I also love that your Smurf, or your Joker impression sounds a lot like your Doug impression.

I think that's really interesting. They're very similar. They're very similar. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They all come from the same place. Yeah. Also, there's other characters too. But the sock puppet, for instance,

is also a little bit of Joker in there too. A little bit, a little bit. Well, also in his motivation. Yeah. So now you've drawn a direct line from Handy Smurf to the Joker. Exactly, that's my Hear Me Out. The Smurfs are a perfect communist utopia, except for when Smurfette is introduced

and everybody feels like that she has a possession they have to own, especially the two more masculine presenting Smurfs. Should I go next? If you have one, yeah, go. All right, hear me out. Even though I feel like Superman the movie is respected and loved,

I still feel like Gene Hackman's performance as Lex Luthor does not get the credit it should get. Mm-hmm. Okay. It is absolutely hilarious the whole way. I mean, he is so dry. Anytime my husband or I knock something over, the other one goes, those cat-like reflexes. But the thing that always gets me is when Superman's gone down to Luthor's lair and he's showing him the map of California as it was, as it will be, and an Otisburg is mentioned.

Yes. Yes, Otisburg. But there's a moment where Superman just says, with real contempt, you know, it's twisted. And Gene Hackman does this thing where it's a little step back and kind of goes, huh. And it's this one moment where he drops the funny. And from this one moment, you realize

there could be real menace here. It's almost like Hector went to going, if this weren't a comedy, you can't imagine what I'd do. And I feel like that one little moment where he'd let that get to Luthor and really get at him, I feel like it grounds the whole performance and I feel like it makes you take him seriously

as a threat even though his threat is in this movie that is funny more often than not. Anyway, I know there are some fans who, there are some fans who don't like that movie because it is funny and that it does acknowledge that this is a man in blue spandex flying through the sky. We can have a sense of humor about some of this. No, when he pulls Lois out of the ground,

that's Julliard. I mean, that is high drama. Yeah, no, that I think is fantastic. I mean, everybody in that movie is killing it. Everybody. But I feel like Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor is the most ignored by the fandom because he is a comic villain,

but I feel like it's an amazing performance and has just the right amount of menace. I love it. That was a great take. Heather, do you have one? I do. Hear me out.

This one, again, Claudia, I'd love to know your opinion on this because you spent just about the most time with this character as anyone. I think Leia was the true chosen one. While Anakin was prophesized to bring balance to the force, Leia was actually the one who had the true potential to fulfill the destiny. She was born of the same bloodline, but unlike either of those men,

she had the discipline, leadership, moral compass to resist both the light and dark tendencies. She was raised in the political environment. I think she was given specifically to bail for the opportunity of someone with her potential and her bloodline to balance the force. And I think if she was able to train as a Jedi earlier, she could have performed the order. Well, she also is the one who purges the dark side from Kylo Ren at the end. So there you

go. I mean, she's the one who purges the Emperor's influence. That's an amazing take. Yeah, I don't know about that. I've always sort of felt that it was Anakin. They just didn't count on the fact that the valance and the force meant a whole lot more darkness. Because it means 50-50. Valance and the force is not necessarily

what you're going for, Qui-Gon. There are downsides to this. I do think it is very interesting to ask who and what she would have been as a Jedi. And that was one of the only things in Bloodline I wanted to dig into at some, you know? And because they approached me for that, still The Force Awakens had not come out.

And that was the one where I was like, okay, is this happening? Is that happening? And they could only tell me so much. But they did explain that Leia was not a Jedi and I wanted to get into that and they were like, hold, hold on that. Right.

I mean, there's a thing, I didn't originate this, but I've seen it in fandom. I think you're right, she is the politician. She is the person who knows how to focus these people together. I mean, she's in that fight before Luke and Han show up and she's in it after they're gone. She's, her whole life is very much defined by that.

But there is sort of saying like that Luke is Padme's son and Leia is Anakin's daughter. Because whose temper is likelier to snap? Yeah, true. Who really digs in in that way? And I think that is something that I deal with in Bloodline. The fact that she had the capacity to be a very great Jedi. She might have had the capacity to be a very great Jedi.

She might've had the capacity to be absolutely terrifying. Yeah. I think though she has the most capacity to balance both sides and tap into both and control both in a way that Anakin couldn't. Yeah, she definitely is, for all that she never feels constrained in the way Mon Mothma does in Andor,

but she is the character that you see kind of pulling it together and forcing her way through these things. Yeah. Well, this was amazing, Claudia. Thank you so much for joining us. Before we say goodbye, please tell everyone where they can find you, what you have coming up, anything else you want to plug.

I'm not on social media much anymore. I do Instagram because I can look at dogs and interior design, and I can keep that to a minimum. And I'm one of the 14 people still on Tumblr, and we're having a great time, yeah. Oh my God, yeah. My accounts are kept up on threads and Facebook, and they will report like when I have events, possibly in your area, or a new book is coming out. I had two releases this year with Into the Light,

which came out in April. And then just last month, we had the fourth. No, wait. Yes, the fourth Darcy and Tell Me Mystery, which was the Rushworth family plot that came out just a month ago. And even though I am very, very busy at the present, I do not believe I have another book coming out until the fifth. Okay. Darcy and Tony mystery. There will be a five and six for sure. Now I also have a comics thing

that I don't know whether or not I can acknowledge it or when exactly it would be coming. We can't, it hasn't been officially announced yet, but I will plug for Claudia. She did dabble in the Star Trek universe with me, but more on that will be revealed, hopefully in the coming months. And that was huge for me,

because I've also been a Trekkie my whole life, hugely, hugely, when you were talking about Lower Decks, I was like, not on mic yet. I was like, oh no, I cannot speak out because I love it so much. And is it next week we get more Strange in Worlds? It is next week. Yeah, next week season three drops.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then they just announced revealing the Starfleet Academy cast and I assume, I don't know, but I assume a trailer at their, at Star Trek's Hall H panel, so. Oh, fantastic. Very exciting, yeah. Yeah, so that was, that was a huge thing for me

to get to do and, but I have no idea when it will appear and we can only say that it exists. I can't believe I got to talk. I mean, this has been great. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Claudia. This was super great. So thrilled to have you here.

This was super, super fun. I think I may have nerded out more than I may have talked about my own books, but. No, that's great. That's what we want. That's totally, totally awesome. I think that's more fun sometimes, just getting to hear people talk about our things we love.

Yeah. Well guys, thank you so much for joining us. You can subscribe to the ScreenCrush Crossover Universe podcast below. We're on all the different platforms, plus on YouTube. If there's anything you wish we would have asked Claudia Gray, let us know in the comments below. Thanks again, Heather, my co-host.

And if it's your first time here, be sure to subscribe and smash that bell for alerts. For ScreenCrush, I'm Ryan Airy.