Kyla Zhao Is Caught Red-Handed
The author on 'The Clique', Denny's, and her new book, 'Valley Verified'
Kyla Zhao is Caught Red-Handed
For this installment of Caught Red-Handed, I’m joined by author and Forbes 30 Under 30 Honoree Kyla Zhao.
Kyla is basically like a rom-com heroine come to life (if said heroine was actually good at her job). She’s a dynamic writer (her first book, The Fraud Squad, came out last year), and has successfully pivoted from the hallowed halls of Vogue to a cutthroat Silicon Valley startup career.
That transition inspired her latest book, released with Random House just this week, called Valley Verified. When Kyla described it to me as The Devil Wears Prada meets Legally Blonde meet Silicon Valley, I was like, “okay, finally someone is writing to my TASTE.”
In between getting her literal novel on shelves, Kyla was gracious enough to tell me about some of the guilty pleasures she indulges in when she’s not winning awards or getting featured on Good Morning America’s buzz lists. Let me tell you, the gal has range!
Your first book, The Fraud Squad, follows a young Anna Delvey type trying to maneuver her way into Singapore’s glamorous high society. Do you remember the first designer item you bought and what it meant to you?
It was a Marc Jacobs skull necklace that I bought from a resale site. I was in middle school and going through a goth phase, so I thought a skull necklace was the coolest thing ever. I actually still have it!
Congrats on your recent Forbes 30 Under 30 status! If you had to build an IKEA wardrobe with one of these three fellow honorees, who would you choose and why? Hailey Bieber, Ayo Edibiri, or Noah Beck.
Hailey Bieber. I prefer loose clothes and she has a great collection of oversized tops and baggy pants.
Can you rank these workplace grievances from least to most egregious? Sending a vague meeting invite with no description, Slacking colleagues on the weekends, hooking up with a coworker.
Slacking colleagues on the weekends: Not bad at all, so long as they don’t expect me to respond before Monday.
Hooking up with a coworker: Nothing too bad about a hookup between two consenting adults, as long as they aren’t in the same reporting chain…
Sending a meeting invite with no description: This is a pet peeve of mine. Right up there with people who call me on Microsoft Teams with no heads up and people who just message me “Hi” and nothing else. It wouldn’t hurt to give more context!
One of your first jobs was a coveted internship at Vogue Singapore – was there a fashion trend that you felt pressured into adhering to, or a trend you wanted to participate in / wardrobe piece you loved that you felt too ashamed to wear in the office?
Many people think of the fashion industry as judgmental and snobbish—and they aren’t necessarily wrong. However, working at Vogue and even back at Harper’s Bazaar when I was just 16 showed me how much room for experimentation exists in fashion: Men came to the office in feather boas and heels; women paired baseball caps with opera gloves. On the streets, those outfits would have attracted lots of side-eyes and gawking, but people in the fashion industry were much more accepting of “eccentric” dressing in the name of personal style.
It did take me way longer than it should have to accept that skinny jeans and bucket hats just don’t suit me…
Picture this: you’re at your office’s holiday “party” and your boss decides you would be a great DJ. What crowd pleasers do you immediately queue up?
Before I Knew It by Mason Ramsey
Havana by Camilla Cabello
Cheap Thrills by Sia
And speaking of parties, what’s your go-to fast food order after a night on the town?
Hear me out: Denny’s – order hashbrown and a strawberry-banana smoothie, then dip the hashbrown into the smoothie. Bonus points if you also put sriracha on the hashbrown.
(My friends think I’m a psychopath for this.)
Your new book Valley Verified has been compared to some of my favorite girlboss movies, The Devil Wears Prada and Legally Blonde. Who is your personal favorite fictional girlboss?
This might be a very niche reference, but Massie Block from The Clique series! Technically, she might not be old enough to be considered a girlboss since she’s a middle school student. But back when I was reading The Clique in middle school, I thought she was just so darn witty and fashionable.
Silicon Valley tech bros are ridiculed for many things: intermittent fasting, treating their Teslas better than their children, having too many opinions about craft beer. Are there any new age Valley trends you’ll cop to engaging in yourself?
Not a trend, per se, but I think many Silicon Valley workers get a kick out of their office perks such as free meals and free snacks—something I good-naturedly poke fun at in my book. I personally love the free coffee bar offered by my company (they make a pretty great matcha latte).
My phone is bursting with apps and it seems like there’s an app for just about anything these days. I satirize this in my book: There is a dating app that matches people based on their attachment styles; there is an app that lets users send “Wassup?” (and only that) to their friends once a day, etc.
I am also an absolute Catan fiend… and the board game gets a shoutout in my book!
Lastly, with 2024 only just underway, do you have a pop culture prediction for what this year might have in store?
Balenciaga will ask North West to design a special capsule youth collection. Kim will accept on North’s behalf, but Kanye will see this as a huge betrayal because of his personal falling out with Balenciaga + he thinks his daughter should only collaborate with him.
In retaliation, he will write a diss track with lyrics like “Demna/when I heard the news/I was like/Damn, bruh”. But everything he does will only bring even more hype to the North West x Balenciaga collection and it will sell out on the first day.
About ‘Valley Verified’
Imagine ‘Legally Blonde’ meets ‘The Devil Wears Prada’, but this time Elle Woods is tackling the cutthroat startup world. In Valley Verified, Zoe Zeng is forced to leave her fashion job in New York and move to Silicon Valley to join a startup, where she must secure an eight-figure investment that could make or break the company—and her future. In this cutthroat land of tech bros, Zoe will have to tackle judgmental coworkers, tech billionaires and her own insecurities to prove she’s more than what meets the eye.
The American Library Association hailed it as: "Brimming with necessary discussion on sexism and gender bias in the tech industry, and with a character that many readers will relate to, Zhao’s latest is a contemporary novel that will appeal to STEM and fashion girlies alike."
Purchase Valley Verified: www.linktr.ee/kylazhao
Yesterday, Betches published my rankings of The Traitors Season 2 cast — check it out before tonight’s drop! And if you’re not watching….what are you doing.
Watching: American Nightmare (Netflix) — three-part docuseries about a wild kidnapping case with twists and turns.
Listening: My “powerful euphoric thursday morning” daylist
Reading: “Inside the ‘Real Life Reality Show’ of the Nine-Month Cruise” (CNN)