Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

Athena Liu is a literary darling and June Hayward is literally nobody.

White lies When Athena dies in a freak accident, June steals her unpublished manuscript and publishes it as her own under the ambiguous name Juniper Song.

Dark humour But as evidence threatens June’s stolen success, she will discover exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.

Deadly consequences… What happens next is entirely everyone else’s fault.

With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface grapples with questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation, as well as the terrifying alienation of social media. R.F. Kuang’s novel is timely, razor-sharp, and eminently readable.

I've been making an active effort this year to read books that are actually released in 2023. I found a few "most anticipated" lists and this was on most of them. I haven't read any other books by Kuang, but I have heard good things about them and they are on my to-read pile, plus this book has a great cover and provoking title. I put this on hold at the library a couple months ago and I was able to check out the audiobook on the actual day of release.

The premise is great: a successful Asian-American author dies unexpectedly, leaving behind an unpublished manuscript which is then claimed by a white friend as her own. Unfortunately, it doesn't explore it's titular issue as deeply as I think it could have. It is more just used as a passing point of tension, among other things.

This was well written, but a lot pulpier than I was expecting. The climax in particular I thought was cheesy and unsatisfying. However, the book does move at a brisk pace though and it was easy to keep turning pages.

The story is told from a first person perspective and the protagonist is extremely unlikable and makes unethical decisions constantly. She is not stupid nor ignorant, so she has at least some semblance of logic to justify her actions. She is entitlement personified. She thinks of herself as liberal, but she's more of a center-right "both sides have good points" sort of person. This can be an interesting perspective to tell a story from, but also makes it hard to latch onto as a reader at times.

I think there are a lot of really great ideas just below the surface here that didn't quite reveal themselves as fully as I was hoping. I'm curious to check out more of Kuang's work now though.

I hate the main character but I guess we all hate her lol. This was a wonderful book. RFK is a fantastic writer and skillfully navigates the loneliness and pressure authors feel, making the drastic decisions juniper makes feel somewhat morally grey rather than outright wrong

I enjoyed Yellowface! It was sort of fun in a satire(ish?), meme-of-a-white-woman, Bodies Bodies Bodies way. We all know a Well Meaning White Woman like June and her racist/microaggressive inner monologue really made me laugh in moments just bc of how familiar it felt as an Asian woman in America. Made me think about how we reach for extremes: only hero or villain, no grey area. I thought things sort of dragged towards the end but overall had fun with it