Last week the monthly book club here at Tales bookcafé had its very first meeting, so as a member, I have gotten the chance to write a review for the Tales blog. This will be a monthly segment, so I will be back in March reviewing our next book, Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton.
The book that we discussed at this meeting was Yellowface by R. F. Kuang, a satirical novel about racism, privilege and the current status of the publishing world. It’s written with humor but ends up painting quite a bleak picture of reality. If you enjoy reading about flawed characters, this book is definitely for you.
The novel follows Juniper “June” Hayward, a struggling author who is growing increasingly frustrated with living in the shadow of her fellow writer and friend, Athena Liu. While June is barely getting her novels published, Athena is writing bestsellers and winning literary prizes. One fateful night, while the two are hanging out at Athena’s apartment, Athena unexpectedly dies, leaving June as the only witness. Earlier that evening, Athena had given her an exclusive look at the manuscript for her upcoming book—a novel about the forgotten Chinese laborers of World War II. In a moment of desperation, June makes the drastic decision to steal it before anyone else gets their hands on it. If she can finish what Athena started, maybe she finally has a shot at making it in the literary world?
The themes of this book revolve a lot around marginalization, and it presents a discussion about creative freedom, specifically whether a writer should be able to write about anything, or if there are subjects reserved only to those affected. I really enjoyed the premise and while I agree that the subject is complex, it was a bit difficult to stay nuanced when I found the character June so insufferable.
The entire book is written from June’s perspective and she is far from a reliable narrator. Large portions of this novel is just her rationalizing her actions, trying to justify what she has done, and making herself the victim in every situation. You have to peel back the layers of her delusions in order to try and get a grip on what’s actually taking place inside the story. I usually enjoy reading about unreliable narrators but reading about all of the poor decisions June keeps repeating over and over again got a bit tiring. I felt like there should have been a greater resolution regarding her delusions, and it would have been nice to get some sort of outside perspective on her character and why she is the way she is.
The dynamic between June and Athena is more complex than it initially seems, and I enjoyed how there wasn’t a single character in this book that was entirely sympathetic, even though it can be sometimes difficult to read a story when you’re not really rooting for anyone. Kuang describes this book as a horror story about loneliness and I agree with that being the scariest aspect of this story, it is filled with broken relationships, selfish behavior and, ultimately, very bleak lives.
While I enjoyed some aspects of the story, I felt that it became a bit too preoccupied with the message, and the plot suffered for it. The second half of the book became a bit messy, and it felt like Kuang had a hard time committing to what her ending was going to be. That could be intentional, as the book does bring up the cyclical nature of controversy and how you can keep spinning a story endlessly, and while the point is fair, it makes for a frustrating reading experience when you have committed to hours of reading only to be left with… nothing really.
All-in-all I would rate this book a 3/5. The premise was interesting and it had a strong and interesting start, but ultimately it left me wanting more.
By Elvira Svensson