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Yellowface

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK

"Hard to put down, harder to forget." -- Stephen King, #1 New York Times bestselling author

White lies. Dark humor. Deadly consequences... Bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who she says she is, she didn't write the book she claims she wrote, and she is most certainly not Asian American--in this chilling and hilariously cutting novel from R.F. Kuang, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Babel.

Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars. But Athena's a literary darling. June Hayward is literally nobody. Who 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 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 grapples with questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation, as well as the terrifying alienation of social media. R.F. Kuang's novel is timely, razor-sharp, and eminently readable.

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384 pages

Average rating: 6.77

2,228 RATINGS

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81 REVIEWS

Community Reviews

Anonymous
Jan 11, 2025
8/10 stars
had a lot of interesting discussion points about getting “diversity points” and white privilege in the publishing world, which can easily be extrapolated to a lot of other places etc etc and it also seems to have a lot of rf kuang self insert based on what i’ve read and heard which is funny to me.

i’m still trying to figure out if kuang quoted herself or not!!!!!!! will update if i figure this out

also why did the mc call her niece a basic bitch in training
Lisa P
Jan 10, 2025
8/10 stars
Interesting story; hits a lot of “hot button” topics (diversity, inclusion, appropriation, social media and cancel culture, racism, jealousy, female friendships etc). At points, it felt a bit annoying and heavy handed with unlikeable main characters, but it IS a satire. 3.5-4 stars
Anonymous
Jan 08, 2025
8/10 stars
Highly compelling horror story. Loved Yellowface and would recommend it. 4.5 stars.
Anonymous
Jan 07, 2025
8/10 stars
Loved the chaotic pacing and the main character as a villain you still somehow root for at points. I did so much cringing, but books usually don't give me such a visceral reaction so that's actually a good thing. Ending was a little off for me, but still super strong premise and execution - hope that R. F. Kuang is able to use this as an example of why she should be able to write about whatever she wants to regardless of what subset of topics people in publishing think AAPI authors should be writing about.
unhingedfemaleprotagonist
Jan 01, 2025
6/10 stars
I have mixed feelings about this book. I did find the story fast paced, well-written and intriguing. The suspense and the cringiness of the situation had me hooked. This book is everything I hope "The Plot" would be (another story about one writer stealing another writer's story). I think there was a lot of great perspective on race in in pop-culture.media...in this case, books and the publishing world. The main theme in this book is how white people/poc are treated differently in this industry. A lot of reviewers complained that it reads as if R.F. Kuang herself was writing about her own experience, as if that were a bad thing. To me, that fact should be a no-brainer, and one of the things readers can appreciate about this book! It is realistic! It speaks to Kuang's lived experience! The discomfort definitely leaves a lot open to thought and debate, and I found in fantastic. I loved how both protagonists (June and Athena) were completely unlikeable people. Their selfishness is what made them so real and believable to me. What also compelled me was their racial experiences and how Kuang gave the reader a very real, raw view of the inner workings of how race is perceived in society (like when Athena was dragged online for dating white guys, or when the waitress in Chinatown was suspicious of June's "friendliness" (you'll get why there are quotes around then when you read it). Overall, I liked this book! I gave it three stars because it has a lot of compelling situations to discuss and interesting protagonists - however, I do feel like June's internal dialog felt a bit dragged out after a while and at certain points the book did start to feel like a of white women.

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