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Posted On: October 27th 2026, 01:47 pm
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For our fourth episode this season we have author and screenwriter Meryl Branch-McTiernan (@outerboroqn) talking with TW Creative Director John Vogel (@jawnvogel) about her recent novel from Akashic Books (@akashicbooks), What You Should Worry About. The book takes us back to before the COVID lockdown, the old normal. And it brings back all the anxiety, isolation, fear, and judgment that was rampant in the first year of shelter-in-place.
As protagonist Layla Moody hops around Sundance in February 2020, she connects with Diana Winn, a director who offers a meeting in New York for Layla to pitch a script. After the festival, she flies from her adopted home of L.A. to her childhood home of NYC and stays at her mother’s apartment. Unexpectedly, COVID shuts everything down, and she becomes stranded in New York.
As her married friends all refuse to hang out — even outside — isolation increases and she makes the unpopular decision to stay at a house share on Fire Island, one of her old happy places. Despite her worries, it turns out to be the right move and finally provides some human connection that had been absent since the onset of the pandemic.
Meryl also co-wrote the 2023 movie Katie’s Mom, which plays with the idea of The Graduate by putting the focus on the older woman instead of the younger male. Beverly Hills, 90210 fans might recognize two of the films starts, Dina Meyer and Jason Wiles, from their roles as Lucinda Nicholson and Colin Robbins.
During the interview, Meryl talks to John about how What You Should Worry About converges to and diverges from her real life during the era of social distance, how she’s been able to balance making art with needing to pay rent, and answers the Perfect Recognition questions.
As protagonist Layla Moody hops around Sundance in February 2020, she connects with Diana Winn, a director who offers a meeting in New York for Layla to pitch a script. After the festival, she flies from her adopted home of L.A. to her childhood home of NYC and stays at her mother’s apartment. Unexpectedly, COVID shuts everything down, and she becomes stranded in New York.
As her married friends all refuse to hang out — even outside — isolation increases and she makes the unpopular decision to stay at a house share on Fire Island, one of her old happy places. Despite her worries, it turns out to be the right move and finally provides some human connection that had been absent since the onset of the pandemic.
Meryl also co-wrote the 2023 movie Katie’s Mom, which plays with the idea of The Graduate by putting the focus on the older woman instead of the younger male. Beverly Hills, 90210 fans might recognize two of the films starts, Dina Meyer and Jason Wiles, from their roles as Lucinda Nicholson and Colin Robbins.
During the interview, Meryl talks to John about how What You Should Worry About converges to and diverges from her real life during the era of social distance, how she’s been able to balance making art with needing to pay rent, and answers the Perfect Recognition questions.
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