What's the harm in a pseudonym? New York Times bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who she says she is, she didn't write the book she claims she wrote, and she is most certainly not Asian American--in this chilling and hilariously cutting novel from R. F. Kuang.
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena's a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn't even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks.
So when June witnesses Athena's death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena's just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.
So what if June edits Athena's novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So …
What's the harm in a pseudonym? New York Times bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who she says she is, she didn't write the book she claims she wrote, and she is most certainly not Asian American--in this chilling and hilariously cutting novel from R. F. Kuang.
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena's a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn't even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks.
So when June witnesses Athena's death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena's just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.
So what if June edits Athena's novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song--complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? Doesn't this piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller? That's what June claims, and the New York Times bestseller list seems to agree.
But June can't get away from Athena's shadow, and emerging evidence threatens to bring June's (stolen) success down around her. As June races to protect her secret, she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.
With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface takes on questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation not only in the publishing industry but the persistent erasure of Asian-American voices and history by Western white society. R. F. Kuang's novel is timely, razor-sharp, and eminently readable.
Gave me anxiety but incredibly riveting and effective
5 stars
Devoured this in two days, half because it carried me along so effectively and half because I wanted to finish it because it made me anxious. This book accomplished what I understood to be its goals with incredible precision. Some of the satire was a bit broad but it was all eminently believable, as were the characters (all a little bit relatable, all a little bit despicable). Absolutely outstanding book. I'm glad to be done with it.
This is a change of pace from the author's other work and it feels somewhat self-referential, but through which character? The story had me hooked, even though the protagonist, if you can call her that, is not exactly sympathetic, and I feel like I've met that person, but after a while, I feel like I could be that person, and everyone in publishing sucks, anyway. Which is the general message I'm getting (in a more clever and entertaining format than all my complaints about the one computer book I published).
Writing an actual review for this one because I found my thinking changing on it as time has passed since completion.
There's a lot going on in this book. It tackles themes of cultural appropriation, tokenism, and privilege in world of book publishing, while at the same time critiquing notions that people can only write a story from their lived perspective. If you think those lines are complex to navigate and somewhat fluid, you'd be right, and Kuang herself seems to have trouble drawing it over the course of the book.
It's a very tense read and moves quickly. Written from June's first-person perspective– certainly an unreliable narrator –it is often an uncomfortable read, which is as it should be when racism is a topic. But June's detractors don't come off particularly great either. The book seems less researched than her other works, but makes up for it in the …
Writing an actual review for this one because I found my thinking changing on it as time has passed since completion.
There's a lot going on in this book. It tackles themes of cultural appropriation, tokenism, and privilege in world of book publishing, while at the same time critiquing notions that people can only write a story from their lived perspective. If you think those lines are complex to navigate and somewhat fluid, you'd be right, and Kuang herself seems to have trouble drawing it over the course of the book.
It's a very tense read and moves quickly. Written from June's first-person perspective– certainly an unreliable narrator –it is often an uncomfortable read, which is as it should be when racism is a topic. But June's detractors don't come off particularly great either. The book seems less researched than her other works, but makes up for it in the intensity of the controversy June must weather as her lies start to unravel.
It's a good book, attempting to tackle real issues, but not Kuang's best. When I finished it, I would have put it at a five stars, but as I've mulling it around in my brain, I think it's probably more like four stars. There's something that feels off, like an unexpected flat note in what is otherwise a tense piece of music. Maybe it's the nature of the topic, but it feels like Kuang wasn't sure which of her points she wanted to drive home, and so attempted to make all of them unevenly. Ultimately, few of the characters seem to learn anything from their experiences.
And as mentioned above, these topics are difficult, so maybe Kuang's goal is simply to illustrate the mess as opposed to providing any answers. But given some of the early build-up, that comes off as disappointing.
