Yellowface

Author: R.F. Kuang

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Format: Digital purchase via Kindle

Publish Date: May 2023

Read: July 2023

Favorite Quote: The rest of us have to keep racing along the hamster wheel of relevance.

Story Synopsis: June Heyward and Athena Liu are quasi-friends. When Athena’s career takes off before graduating college, June is left to stand on the sidelines and watch as Athena achieves literary stardom. As June slowly begins to get over professional jealousy, Athena dies tragically in front of June.

With Athena’s first draft of her latest novel in June’s bag for initial thoughts, June passes Athena’s original work off as her own. Thus begins the rollercoaster of publishing a successful novel, but for June, it’s under false pretenses. June faces her own guilt, character attacks, cancellation, and so much more in a vain desire to be the literary darling she always wanted.

Why does this book beguile? Talk about beguiling. This book - just wow.

Yellowface, according to author R.F. Kuang, is a horror novel about loneliness in the publishing industry. Yes, and it’s much, much more. Yellowface explores racism, plagiarism, artistic license, and commodification in fascinating ways. Written with such empathy for each character, I found myself holding multiple contradictory thoughts and ideas in my mind at the same time. Everyone believes they are right, but who or what actually is right? What rationalizations and arguments do we have in our minds to create the narrative that makes us the happiest (or the least wrong)? I am still processing this book and will be thinking about it for a long time.

Rating: 5/5 - A MUST READ

Link*: Yellowface by R.F. Kuang - Amazon | Yellowface by R.F. Kuang - Bookshop.org

If you like this, read*: Babel: An Arcane History by R.F. Kuang