Kaila Yu used to tell people that she was born in Tai Pei, she was actually born in Lawence Kansas and moved to Southern California at a young age where she was reared by her tiger mom parents until she discovered ecstasy and cocaine in Socal's rollicking rave scene of the early aughts. She dropped out of UCSD and became an import model making money as a pinup girl in the underground world of street racing. She eventually got sober and worked every twelve-step program under the sun before finding her footing as a writer. She's just written a new memoire published by Penguin Randomhouse called- "Fetishized - A reckoning with Yellow Fever, Feminism and Beauty" which explores how media, pop culture, and colonialism as well as her own behavior have contributed to the oversexualization of Asian women.
