Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

 

Hello my lovely readers!

This was a vacation read for me while out in Egypt and Jordan and this book was...interesting, but very surface level. Let's get into it!

SYNOPSIS

Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu are supposed to be rising stars in the publishing world, but Athena comes out on top as a cross-genre literary darling while June can't even get a paperback release of her debut novel.

When Athena dies in front of June, she acts on impulse and steals Athena's "masterpiece," an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.

June Hayward soon becomes Juniper Song and becomes a New York Times bestselling author thanks to the edits she made to Athena's novel, which no one knows about.

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.

MY THOUGHTS

I thought this was an interesting novel, but it felt a bit like a rant toward Twitter critics and came across as shallow. 

June was absolutely delusional. Are we really pulling the "white people are being overrun" card now as a reason to steal someone else's work and justify it? She had no concept of what minorities have experienced their entire lives and now in the "age of diversity" she feels threatened.  Absolutely comical.

However, I was hoping for a more insightful critique of racism in the publishing industry rather than just a response to real life criticism the author has received. It was still an entertaining book to pass the time, though.