[REVIEW] Yellowface, by R.F. Kuang

(Buy this book here.)

I got a little tired of being the last blogger on the internet who hadn’t read this book, so I finally picked up a copy and packed it in my carry-on for an overnight flight.

I had to sleep. I knew I had to sleep. I still stayed up and finished this whole book and showed up in Frankfurt Airport (a.k.a. air transit purgatory) seriously grumpy and sleep-deprived.

Yellowface is quite a departure for R.F. Kuang. It’s literary fiction–almost a thriller–and she’s known for her fantasy novels, like the Poppy War series(I previously reviewed The Poppy War and The Dragon Republic in all their bone-breaking life-taking glory) and the alternate Oxford takedown of colonialism with word magic, Babel. But when everything an author writes is a best-seller, departures and experimentation are encouraged so, Yellowface is a literary novel criticizing the publishing industry.

I think what fascinates me about this book is its audacity. It lays bare what those of us who pay close attention to the world of books and writers already know; behind the scenes, commercial publishing is skewed towards whiteness, and often white femininity. This book dives into the nasty spaces behind the scenes. Everyone’s an ally, yet acclaimed writers who aren’t white collect marginal advances compared to their unknown, whiter, more “marketable” counterparts. High-profile writers of color are creatively marginalized into expected narratives. Cultural pain and authenticity are reduced to entertaining commodities. Jealousy, loneliness, and competition mar creativity and connection. Yellowface pulls very few punches and kills quite a lot of self-righteous industry darlings.

And it does it all by working very hard to try and make you empathize with June Hayward, who may be the most Casually Awful White Woman In The World. June witnesses her frenemy, impossibly cool Asian author Athena Liu, die in a freak accident. Somehow Athena’s work in progress finds its way into June’s possession and after revising it to her taste, she passes it off as her own and brands herself as vaguely Asian to market it. The resulting roller coaster of guilt, accusations, and dirty deals feels scarily realistic and grimy.

It’s a light but complex read–Kuang can still write her ass off and that’s on full display here. The ending was a bit pat for me, but the nuance infused into the characters was fascinating. Everyone’s awful, but everyone’s sad, too. Sometimes the people who create beautiful things are living deeply isolated, envious lives. Sometimes your friends really can’t be trusted–even after death.

I don’t even know what to give Yellowface. Discomfort? Useless DEI training? A support group?

(Beautiful people, this book is a trip. I’ve read very little like it but I hope more is coming. For more diverse books for diverse readers, please check out the Equal Opportunity Bookshop, where we earn a commission for any books you purchase through our links. By ‘we’, I mean me, and since I have books to read, I’ll end today’s note here. Peace! Now go read something good!)