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Monday 14 August 2023

Book Review: YELLOWFACE by R. F. Kuang

 


Title: YELLOWFACE

Author:  R.F. Kuang

Read: August 2023

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟

 

Book Description:

 

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.



My musings:

 


Have you ever dreamed of writing your own novel? Of sitting in some romantic café scribbling in your notebook and penning the next bestseller. Of having your book grace the front window of bookshops worldwide. After reading Kuang’s novel you may have a more sober perspective of the publishing industry. I never thought it would be easy to be a published author, but hadn’t imagined just how many minefields are lying in wait for any aspiring writer, including the questions at the heart of YELLOWFACE: who owns a story? Who is allowed to tell a story? Does your story have to mirror your own culture and experiences?

 

YELLOWFACE was peppered with ethical and moral dilemmas, and I fluctuated between empathy for June and horror at what she was doing. Many reviewers have stated that June is a thoroughly unlikeable character who is very obviously in the wrong, and many delighted in her downfall. And yet I found Kuang has created a character who is both morally reprehensible and also vulnerable, lonely and insecure. June always has justification for her actions, and some were strangely compelling, like watching a movie about a robbery and knowing it’s a crime, yet having some appreciation for the planning and thought that had gone into it. Hard to explain … Things got even more complex as Athena’s character was cast in a different light later in the novel, blurring the lines further.

 

I was particularly intrigued by the issue of cultural appropriation. Is a writer only allowed to write characters from their own cultural backgrounds? Where are the boundaries? Can you write a police novel or a medical thriller without ever having worked in those fields? I am sure that everyone has an opinion on this, and I imagine it’s a hotly debated issue, which made June’s justifications for her theft and reinvention all the more interesting.

 

All in all, YELLOWFACE is a brilliant, thought-provoking satire that delves into many of the issues encountered in the publishing industry today. With intriguing characters and many ethical questions, it made for fascinating reading from beginning to end. Entertaining and scandalising in equal parts, YELLOWFACE is one of the most original books I have read this year so far. 


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