Yellowface by R.F Kuang

  

Yellowface by R.F Kuang

Tiny Overview

June Hayward is a white author and friends with Athena Liu, who is Asian-American. After meeting up to celebrate Athena's new accomplishment, she chokes and dies in front of June. To cope, June steals the last unpublished novel that Athena had written and passes it off as her own.

Themes:

• Psychological Fiction
• Suspense
• Thriller
• Mystery
• Cultural Appropriation
• Race
• Ambition
• Guilt

Context

This is the fifth book written by R.F. Kuang. All of the previous books were fantasy novels, making this one stand out.

In an interview with The Rumpus, she said that she drew on her real experiences of what people have said to her and what she has dealt with during publishing, admitting that "very little of this book is made-up".

My Waffling

I was so determined out of nowhere to read this book, I don't even know why. I got a library card, read my first paperback in months, and finished it in two days. 

I don't think it would be unfair to say this book was educational. I learnt a lot about publishing and movie rights, all the meetings, and how stressful it all is. I would definitely be the same if I was ever wrote a book, let alone stealing one. 

I found it very interesting that as we watch June descend into delirium, she justified her actions more and more. Saying that Athena stole all of her books by stealing them from other people, passing them off as her own original ideas and winning competitions from that. Something not too far off that happened to me a couple years ago. Her madness was also not all her fault, as it was being fueled by someone else who was taunting her. Not going to spoil too much. 

Everything in this book was great. I read it in two days. I can see why this book kicked up so much fuss. I found it horrendous to read how she was talking to Athena's mum, I had to put the book down for a minute to breathe.

As the reader, you both hate June and want her to win in a weird way. It's morally ambiguous with a slightly unreliable narrator, making it tense and murky at times. With June and the other characters, you don't seem to get really attached to them. I am unsure if this is because the book is written from June's perspective, and she goes through isolation phases. This understandably makes it difficult for the people around her, but she doesn't really have any outside of her publishing team. Her mum and sister are still around, but they have a strained relationship that makes her family not a big part of her life.

Personally, I think that the cancel culture bits were a bit much sometimes. I am convinced it doesn't exist, as long as the person being "cancelled" doesn't care, carries on, then nothing changes other than slightly dropped views. However, it might be that when I think of cancel culture I think of it as when right wing comedians set up a joke so they can own the left, trying to make the others look stupid. It's similar to that but not quite, in a way that I can't really explain.

I did enjoy the book.

4/5