Writing a novel is a lonely endeavor, one that requires thousands of hours in quiet solitude. Or so I used to believe. In the years after the pandemic, I started meeting with four other writers — Jade Chang, Angela Flournoy, Aja Gabel and Xuan Juliana Wang — for regular work sessions at Little Dom’s, the cozy Italian American restaurant on Hillhurst Avenue in Los Feliz. We sat cloistered in a corner booth and adhered to the Pomodoro method, increasing the usual 25 minutes of work to 40, with breaks in between to talk, over giant meatballs in marinara sauce, fried potatoes with garlic and lemon, butter lettuce Italian tuna salad. What did we talk about in those breaks? Seldomly about our book projects — but everything else, from the serious to the frivolous. The point wasn’t to share pages or workshop chapters. All of us had published one book and were writing our sophomore manuscripts. The point, simply, was being together, bearing witness to each other’s lives, week by week, as women and as friends.
This fall, three from our group have new novels out: Jade Chang’s “What a Time to Be Alive”; Angela Flournoy’s “The Wilderness”; and Aja Gabel’s “Lightbreakers.” We met up for lunch, no laptops this time, to reflect on the years since we began meeting for “poms."
Link in bio.
Words @jeanho66
Photography @nori.rasmussenmartinez
Subjects @hellojadechang@angelaflournoy@ajagabel@boyandgirlaffair
🚨Cover reveal alert!🚨 “Lightbreakers” by Aja Gabel is coming from Riverhead Books on November 4, 2025. Check out this gorgeous cover, designed by Sara Wood, then head to the 💡link in our bio💡to read more about book and the process behind the design.
NYC! Come say hi 5/2 at 12:30pm — worldvoices.pen.org for more info.
+ one photo where the photographer said “Do anything! Be silly!” and that’s what I did + another photo of a photo of me drinking coffee at Little Dom’s. Who knows what pose I’ll adopt next
Link in bio to read this essay on why David and I got married 10 months after our first date like crazy people!
*photos of baby me and baby David in 2018*
specifically for every well-paid screenwriter who has said to me, “gee, I’d love to write a novel!”
—> photo of me holding a cake I made to indicate general feedback disposition
Save the date for Wednesday, March 11, 2026 from 6:30–8 p.m. (PT) for WeHo Reads: Writing Together—Pomodoros, Marinara, and Friendship
Writing a book is often imagined as a solitary act: thousands of quiet hours, alone with a blinking cursor. But for five friends—Jade Chang, Angela Flournoy, Aja Gabel, Jean Chen Ho, and Xuan Juliana Wang—that myth unraveled in a corner booth at Little Dom’s, an Italian American restaurant in Los Feliz where they gathered week after week to write together.
This moderated literary conversation brings these five women of color together to reflect on what it meant to build a creative practice rooted in friendship.
Featuring:
Jade Chang, author of two critically acclaimed novels, What a Time to Be Alive and The Wangs vs. the World, which won the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award;
Angela Flournoy, author of The Wilderness, a national bestseller that was long-listed for the National Book Award;
Aja Gabel, author of the novel Lightbreakers and a screenwriter;
Jean Chen Ho, author of Fiona and Jane; and
Xuan Juliana Wang, author of the short story collection Home Remedies, winner of the California Book Award for First Fiction.
WeHo Reads: Writing Together—Pomodoros, Marinara, and Friendship
Wednesday, March 11, 2026 | 6:30–8 p.m. (PT)
Online via Zoom and YouTube
Free, RSVP Requested: /e/weho-reads-writing-togetherpomodoros-marinara-and-friendship-tickets-1983004222009?aff=writers
WeHo Reads is a literary series presented by the City of West Hollywood. For more information and events, visit /wehoreads. The 2026 season is produced by BookSwell, a literary media company amplifying historically excluded voices. Additional support is provided by media partnerships with Book Soup and Los Angeles Review of Books. Attendees are advised that the program may include mature language and themes.
