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A review by kayaj
Yellowface by R.F. Kuang
5.0
From the title alone, you know Yellowface is going to take you on a thrill ride. Of course, the question becomes: when is Twitter referenced too much in a book*?
*it’s twitter. it will always be twitter. i ain’t having any of that x mumbo jumbo on here
We are thrown into the perspective of June Hayward, a midlist author whose rival is Athena Liu, beloved by the literary world. They’re loosely friends, but what happens when June is the only one to witness Athena’s untimely death? And what happens when she, as a white author, takes Athena’s manuscript, edits it, and publishes it as a new, rebranded, slightly racially ambiguous version of herself? The publishing version of the Titanic, that’s what. And that, my friends, is the mere premise of Yellowface.
This entire book toes the line between racial politics and a critique of the publishing industry. Anyone who has even a slight interest in the cogs and gears of the machine that is publishing should read this book. It’s not perfect, in fact, it is incredibly apparent in its bias. However, as we read from the first-person perspective of June Hayward, we see how authors fight for their voices to be heard. We see the impact of Goodreads reviews, the onslaught of Twitter hashtags, and the inner world of agents, deals, and royalties.
What does all of this mean? It means that sure: this book will be dated sooner rather than later. Twitter is already not technically called twitter* anymore. However, I believe that this book is an incredible snapshot into the depths of the publishing industry as it exists right now. This is not a modern classic as literary classics are often thought of. Instead, it is a direct shot at the complexities of publishing.
“And I wonder if that’s the final, obscure part of how publishing works: if the books that become big do so because at some point everyone decided, for no good reason at all, that this would be the title of the moment.”
*it took me a long time to admit that, and just barely.
On the other hand, this is an examination of racial politics. June Hayward changed her author name to Juniper Song and released a stolen manuscript from a Chinese author, on Chinese workers during a historical period. As the book progresses, we are continually subject to June’s increasingly desperate attempts to both hide her actions and to justify them. Kuang does an excellent job writing a character who feels well-realized, and not overtly racist. But don’t get me wrong: June Hayward’s racism comes across in other ways. She edits the book to make it less Chinese, and therefore, more accessible to a white audience. Yet, Yellowface uses June’s character to bring up great points about race, and how it can relate to the publishing industry.
One critique of Kuang is that she does not handle race with nuance. Yet, she’s not just deft in her portrayal of June’s racism in subtle ways. Athena’s character is also complex. Athena was not perfect, and that is clear from a perspective beyond June’s. Kuang also brings up the discourse of Chinese authors vs. Chinese-American authors, which extends to the idea of diaspora and diversity in writing.
You can’t tear your eyes away from this trainwreck, from this slowly sinking ship of mistakes. This might not be the most complex book, nor the most beautifully written book. However, this is a story that is brilliantly satirical, that is full of a surprising array of nuanced questions pertaining to multiple topics. It’s actually quite an impressive novel, both meta and unique, and for that it gets 5 stars from me!