Born in Mianyang, China and raised in Montana and Southern California, Irving Ruan is a Chinese American novelist, TV/film writer, multi-disciplinary artist, and former software engineer/startup founder.
After graduating from the University of California, San Diego with a B.S. in Computer Science, Irving spent a decade in Silicon Valley building software and consulting for places like Blue Origin, Apple, and the U.S. Department of Energy. His work in technology has spanned across various fields, including marine life conservation, music streaming, and particle accelerators.
Named by Paste Magazine as one of the best humorists writing today, Irving is a contributing writer for The New Yorker magazine. His writing has appeared in McSweeney's Quarterly, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Funny Or Die, CollegeHumor, Hyphen Magazine, The Bold Italic, and elsewhere. He is a former member of the San Francisco Writers Grotto and his work has been included in The New Yorker’s best Shouts & Murmurs of 2019, 2020, and 2021.
A selection of Irving’s writing has been anthologized in McSweeney’s 21st anniversary essay collection, Keep Scrolling Till You Feel Something, as well as McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern Issue No. 53, which won the 2019 National Magazine Award in Fiction.
Irving is an alum of the improv, sketch, and satire program at The Second City in Chicago. In 2022, he was named by The Tracking Board’s annual Next List as one of thirty emerging TV/film writers to watch. He was also one of twenty Fellows selected to participate in the Warner Brothers Discovery (formerly HBO) Access Writing Fellowship. In 2024, he was chosen by Dan Lin’s Rideback Rise, a content accelerator for mid-level TV/film writers, to participate in its Rise Circle cohort.
He’s developed projects for Disney, Warner Brothers, and, most recently, was a writer on the half-hour comedy Twisted Metal (Sony/Peacock) starring Anthony Mackie, Stephanie Beatriz, and Will Arnett. He is currently writing on an upcoming greenlit AMC drama series set in the world of Silicon Valley.
Irving is a member of the Writers Guild of America and lives in Los Angeles. He is represented by 3 Arts and CAA.