Review by New York Times Review
women's dispatches from enemy territory hold a distinct fascination: The basic structures of misogyny are constitutional, and there is a pleasure, for many female readers at least, in seeing everyday structural unfairness reflected back in fiction. But I suspect most of us stay for the quirks of the world-building - the exposé of a niche or rarefied culture. And as no book is born in a vacuum, ours is a climate in which these women's voices - speaking from foreign, masculine terrain - seem not just louder, but full of echoes. With this context in mind, I approached two new novels, both set in Silicon Valley and written by women, with a mixture of trepidation and titillation. Anyone writing about an industry that has been so heavily traversed in literature and entertainment and the media does bear a certain responsibility to add to the conversation in a meaningful way. I wonder now whether a reiteration of the same aesthetics - so well known to us through television and film - can still cut it, or if today's standards require women to say something ... more. Or it is enough that there are women in the room at all; is that the more we actually need? These two novels have nothing in common beyond those superficial trappings of life in that once-rural valley south of San Francisco. There are lots of helicopters, private planes and first-class tickets, overthe-top parties benefiting the charity of the moment. Both books foreground female protagonists who work with, or for, the boy-genius college dropout-turned-philosopher-king. Guru-trained (of course), he's soft-spoken, but volatile. Elisabeth Cohen brings us "The Glitch," an ambitious and entertaining novel that centers on Shelley Stone, the chief executive of a fictional company, Conch (imagine your iPhone in the shape of a tiny shell that nestles behind your ear, whispering helpful and vital information to you all day). Seemingly based on female executives in the mold of Sheryl Sandberg, the protagonist is one of those women who routinely advise us that we, too, can "have it all." Their optimism is underwritten by their supernatural ability to wake up at 3:30 a.m., an hour that Shelley describes as "my me time. I'm on the treadmill - it's so relaxing. I love having the chance to just browse the papers - local, international - while pounding out a couple of leisurely seven-minute miles and ... doing a little spreadsheet crunching, mapping out next quarter's acquisitions. Sometimes I read classic literature." It's hard not to read Cohen's gentle satire in this: multitasking as the highest human good, and Shelley Stone as our patron saint. Cohen is a shrewd writer; her take on Shelley's life is slightly tongue-in-cheek, though the first-person narrative is never mocking. In the novel's opening scene, Shelley has no self-awareness about how unbalanced her life has become. On "vacation" with her husband, Rafael, their two children and the stalwart nanny in the South of France (both parents are working more or less the entire trip), their 4-year-old daughter goes missing. She and Rafael both continue their muted conference calls for seven minutes as they search for their child. Child care is Shelley's one area of inadequacy: She's able to finish the call, but she can't find her daughter. The family eventually reunited, the scare does not occasion the reckoning one might expect regarding Shelley's relationship to her work. She knows it makes her unlikable, that people think she's a bad mother, that her husband is unhappy. It's not that she doesn't care, it's that she just doesn't doubt her decisions. In a flashback to when she was offered the chance to be considered for the chief executive position she now has, she recalls: "For a moment I felt scared and worried - what if it was too much for me? But I looked into his eyes and said, 'Yes, of course.' I didn't say: honored, grateful, me? Those are the things women tend to say. I said, 'Thanks for your support. I agree I'd be the right choice.' " But a character who resists change can't anchor a novel such as this one. The "glitch" in Shelley's impeccably calibrated system is the unexpected appearance of a young woman who claims to be the younger Shelley. That irrational encounter precipitates the narrator's steady unraveling and final confrontation with what I can only call the absurd. But what is the "glitch," really, for the rest of us? It's a question of work, and what it costs women to do it. In the other corner we have Anna Yen's lighthearted, effervescent roman â clef, "Sophia of Silicon Valley." The novel opens with the eponymous 20-something of vaguely focused ambition whiling away her days working at an investment bank. Her plan is as follows: "Until I found Prince Charming, I'd spend my time living it up 'Sex and the City' style while working at Global Partners - the place that would lead me to parties, cute banker and stock trader boys, and off-site boondoggles. That was what I couldn't wait for." She's living at home with her Taiwanese parents, who won't let her move out until she's married. Indeed, marriage seems to be the only thing on Sophia's mind as she lucks into job after job, with a "persistence" that is described as bordering on "manipulative," until she lands a position we're led to believe she's totally unqualified for: head of investor relations for the dream nerd-boss Scott Kraft, the chief executive of Treehouse, an animated film company (Pixar, anyone?). "Sophia of Silicon Valley" is a moving ode to Scott's mentorship of the young protegee, and to their growing friendship. When Sophia goes on to work for a bombastic, arrogant space transport executive (with a South African accent she finds irresistible) who's trying to save the planet with electric cars, we want her to go back to Scott and his unflinching but subtly compassionate ways. Their relationship and its travails are the heartstrings of the book. The problem is, Yen plays it safe. The book is full of lovingly recalled fights between Sophia and Scott, of the myriad life lessons he offers when in guru mode, comprising the very slow evolution that leaves Sophia only somewhat more independent and confident. What's lacking is any sort of critique of a culture that we know to be rife with bias (unconscious and otherwise), to say nothing of gross misconduct. Sexist, racist comments fly by our heroine without her giving so much as a glance in their direction. Sophia's can-do attitude and relentless work ethic preclude her from ever fully reflecting on what it is she dreams for out of Silicon Valley. And without a sense of what she wants (or, at least, doesn't want), we're left with a book that can be delightful, but ultimately only skims the surface. STEPHANIE danler is the author of "Sweetbitt t
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [June 3, 2018]
Review by Booklist Review
As the youngest daughter of Taiwanese immigrants, Sophia is expected to live at home until she gets married, even though her no-nonsense attitude, mostly learned from her mother, has landed her a lucrative gig working for Scott Kraft, the eccentric genius founder of a tech company and a thinly veiled Steve Jobs. Her success at work hasn't translated to her personal life, and she longs to find a partner who won't be threatened by her career or her overprotective parents. It's all a balancing act that Sophia cannot maintain forever, and indeed, her long hours and stress threaten her relationships and lead to a serious health scare. Debut novelist Yen's years of working with multiple tech companies provide a real insider's peek at the craziness of the industry while still keeping it light. This is Silicon Valley chick lit with a smart and smart-ass heroine trying to have it all, and readers of books like Elisabeth Egan's A Window Opens (2015) and Allison Pearson's I Don't Know How She Does It (2002) will enjoy this modern take.--Sexton, Kathy Copyright 2018 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Yen's disappointing debut takes readers back to the early days of the tech industry's rise. The daughter of successful Taiwanese immigrants, Sophia Young is hired as investor relations person at Treehouse, a groundbreaking computer-based animation studio founded by eccentric visionary Scott Kraft. Sophia, who still lives at home, is so dedicated to her new job that it eventually costs her the love of her boyfriend, Daniel, an environmental consultant. After a serious illness causes her to reassess her priorities, Sophia accepts a job from Andre Stark, an equally eccentric visionary and inventor of a radical new type of automobile. But will Sophia ever be able to reconcile her personal and professional lives? The author, whose background includes working at Pixar and Tesla, obviously knows the terrain but can't breathe life into the novel. Unfortunately, this familiar story of a woman coming into her own while working for a demanding boss falls flat. (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
DEBUT This first novel is a fast-paced romp through the boom years of the tech industry. Sophia is the daughter of Taiwanese immigrants who have trained her from birth to get what she wants. In her case, it's landed her in the path of Scott Kraft, a tech visionary in the mold of Steve Jobs and Elon Musk. At age 25, she becomes Scott's right-hand woman, managing him as much as she manages his company. When she's hired by another company, Sophia wonders if being filthy rich is worth living in the wild boys' club that is Silicon Valley. Yen's brash and frenetically energetic novel leaves readers gasping in its wake as it sets a brutal pace through Sophia's life. She is bold, although her realizations and actions at times feel out of place, and possibly tone-deaf, in light of the burgeoning #MeToo movement. VERDICT The author's experience in the tech industry lends authenticity to this novel, and fans of Lauren Weisberger's The Devil Wears Prada may appreciate the cutthroat atmosphere if not the lack of Prada. [See Prepub Alert, 10/22/17.]-Mara Dabrishus, Ursuline Coll. Lib., Pepper Pike, OH © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A new college grad figures out life, love, and the tech world in Yen's breezy debut.The outspoken daughter of traditional Taiwanese parents in the Bay Area, Sophia Young returns home newly graduated from college with a very clear life plan: a few years working at a shiny investment bank until she meets "The One," and then "the white picket fence, two kids (preferably twins), and the Mrs. Homemaker lifestyle" that's been her dream since childhood. So when speaking out of turn gets her fired at the bank, she's momentarily distraughtuntil her best friend helps her get a paralegal gig working on initial public offerings and Sophia is initiated into the startup world, where her no-nonsense pluck makes her a star. Soon, Sophia is managing investor relations and doubling as the right-hand man for a Steve Jobs-like tech founder, and her white picket fence visions give way to new dreams. But finding a partner who can support her ambitions isn't necessarily easy, Sophia discovers, and amid her success, she's started neglecting her health. But the biggest test is yet to come: When Andre Stark, a flashy tech founder, convinces her to come run investor relations for himleaving her beloved old team behindshe finds herself miserable in his Ivy League boys' club and is forced to make her biggest decision yet. A lone mismatched boyfriend aside, Sophia's world is populated with benevolent and powerful mentors who consistently recognize her hard work (if nothing else, the novel offers a road map for good management), doting parents, a ride-or-die best friend, and few personal flaws of substance, giving the novel a certain fairy-tale quality. While the plot takes the occasional off-kilter jag, this is a much-needed professional coming-of-age story; one only wishes it were a slightly more insightful one.Like so many startups, glossy, fun, and ambitious if not particularly deep. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
