158: Loveboat Reunion, with Abigail Hing Wen

For those of you who grew up not seeing yourself in books, or for those of you who did, but want to understand what that may be like for others - this next episode is one you don’t want to miss.

Today, we’re so excited to speak with Abigail Hing Wen, the author of both the New York Times bestselling book Loveboat Taipei and her newest book, Loveboat Reunion, and hear all about her writing journey, why she writes YA books, more about the characters in Loveboat Reunion,  and why it’s so important to have more Asian voices and characters, or really, diverse characters doing very normal things, in the books that we read and those that we share with others.

What to listen for: 

Abigail’s journey to writing - including when she and MIsasha intersected at law school!  How Abigail wants to move the needle on representation, and what representation even means The decision to write an Asian character with a learning difference - and the reaction from her audience about it Writing from experience vs writing from research, and the tenacity required to get a book of this quality out.  26 drafts!!!!!

 

About Abigail: 

"Abigail Hing Wen has a knack for trying and succeeding at new things." Forbes 2021

Abigail is a New York Times Best Selling Author, a rare woman-in-tech leader specializing in artificial intelligence, a new filmmaker as well as a wife and mother of two. She writes and speaks about tech, AI ethics, women's leadership, implicit bias, equity, and transforming culture.

Abigail penned the New York Times best-selling novel, Loveboat, Taipei (sequel, HarperCollins 2022). She is executive producing the book-to-film adaptation with ACE Entertainment, creators of the Netflix franchise, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before. She and her work have been profiled in Entertainment Weekly, Forbes, Fortune, Cosmopolitan, NBCNews, Bloomberg, Google Talk, and the World Journal, among others.

Abigail holds a BA from Harvard, where she took coursework in film, ethnic studies, and government. She also holds a JD from Columbia and MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. In her career in tech, she has negotiated multibillion-dollar deals on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley, worked in venture capital, and hosted Intel’s Artificial Intelligence podcast featuring leading industry experts including Andrew Ng, Facebook's Chief AI Scientist Yann LeCun, and US Congresswoman Robin Kelly. She also serves with the Partnership on AI. “One of the most respected voices in fairness and AI.” Forbes.

Abigail lives with her husband and two sons in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her third novel (2023) explores cognitive differences in Silicon Valley and she is writing her fourth novel and a feature film script based in Silicon Valley, as well as producing a girls-in-tech animated series. 

For more information: www.abigailhingwen.com 

Follow IG/Twi: @abigailhingwen