Sidework

by Sasha Wol-Soon Hom

Sasha Hom's Sidework is a lyric, page-turning novella about a homeless Korean adoptee and mother of four. During her busy Sunday shift waiting tables, her customers— rock stars, locals, and the Grim Reaper himself— bring her face to face with larger issues of motherhood, suicide, environmental degradation, death, and belonging. In this thought-provoking and often humorous debut from award-winning author Sasha Hom, herself a Korean adoptee and mother of four, the protagonist loses her home when the intentional community/commune where she and her family used to live— off-grid, in a canvas tent on three hundred acres— is sold. Sidework takes place during a Sunday breakfast shift as the homeless hero waits tables at a popular 'Cash Only' diner tucked in the Redwoods, frequented by growers, rock stars, Dreamers, tycoons, and tourists alike. But with each order she takes, each interaction serves only to bring her closer to her ghosts. Unnamed and unknown, from far-off continents, they ask her what it means to be a good mother. Hom's debut marries the mystic and mythic with the mundane while taking on issues of immigration, colonization, climate change, homophobia, motherhood and adoption.

Genres: Fiction

166 pages, Paperback

Published March 18, 2025

Reviews

[meg · Rating 3 out of 5]

how did she make $3k #girlboss

[Harley Silas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love you Sasha. This book was as beautiful as you are.

A wonderful book that made me feel so many emotions. Highly reccomend.

[Patricia Meyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here’s where 2025 gets really interesting: Sasha Hom’s Sidework (released March 18, 2025) is a lyric novella, not a memoir. But don’t mistake fiction for fabrication, this book tells adoptee truths that sometimes only narrative art can access.

I met Sasha at AWP this past spring, and her energy matches her work: grounded, radical, unflinching. She’s a Korean adoptee and mother of four who lives off-grid in Vermont on a 600-acre land co-op, running Bottomless Well, a refuge and laboratory for arts and ecologically oriented folks. She homeschools her kids, herds goats, and works on others’ farms. She’s earned an MFA from Warren Wilson College as a Holden Minority Scholar and received grants from Sustainable Arts Foundation and others.

Why This Novella Matters
It centers a homeless Korean adoptee mother. The protagonist waits tables at a cash-only diner tucked in the Redwoods during a busy Sunday shift. She’s homeless—her family lost their home when the intentional community where they lived off-grid in a canvas tent on three hundred acres was sold.

This is not the adoptee narrative we usually get. This is what happens when when motherhood and homelessness collide, when the myth of the “grateful adoptee” collides with economic reality.

It uses the mystic and mythic to explore the mundane. During her shift, the protagonist’s customers—rock stars, locals, the Grim Reaper himself—bring her face to face with larger questions of motherhood, suicide, environmental degradation, death, and belonging. Unnamed ghosts from far-off continents ask her what it means to be a good mother.

Hom marries the mystical with the mundane in ways that capture how adoptee identity actually feels: layered, atmospheric, haunted by questions we can’t quite articulate, visited by ghosts we can’t quite name.

It tackles everything at once. Immigration, colonization, climate change, homophobia, motherhood, adoption—Hom doesn’t separate these issues because they don’t separate in lived experience. For adoptees, especially transracial and transnational adoptees, these forces intersect in bodies, families, and survival strategies.

Why Fiction Matters to Our Movement
Sometimes memoir can’t do what fiction can. Memoir is bound by what actually happened; fiction can crystallize emotional truth in ways that transcend individual circumstance. A homeless Korean adoptee mother waiting tables while confronting the Grim Reaper and unnamed ghosts? That’s metaphor. That’s mythology. That’s the psychic landscape of adoption rendered visible.

Hom’s work has appeared in Exposition Review, Brink, The Millions, Literary Mama, Kweli Journal, and the Journal of Korean Adoption Studies. She’s been recognized with awards that honor both craft and activism. She understands that adoptee stories deserve literary artistry, not just therapeutic processing.

[Jotham Burrello · Rating 5 out of 5]

Structurally inventive and poetically voiced, Hom’s narrator is a homeless waitress and mother of four struggling to survive a hectic breakfast shift in fire-ravaged California. In his blurb for the novella, Alexander Chee captures it best: it’s a “lyric examination of a life lived on the edges of other people’s happiness.” She’s a kind, hardworking woman — a waitress who, like the “ass-shaker,” is wonderful and deserving of a home.

[Jared · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a gift to read this book on bus rides through Spain. To be reminded of the vividness of life everywhere from an immense talent and a forever cohort friend

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

The person who wrote the review that led me to this book liked the book much more than I did. I liked the pace at times and some of the narrator's humor.

[Gemma Park · Rating 4 out of 5]

humurous, profound, and very human
maybe 3.75