Yellowface: The instant #1 Sunday Times bestseller and Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick from author R.F. Kuang

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I reread this for my book club and am so glad we did a buddy read and live show. This is a book worthy of discussion. It has both blatant and nuanced themes of racism and xenophobia that might go over some reader's heads or might seem too in-your-face for others. A group discussion can help reader's recognize the realism of R.F. Kuang's literary approach and see that even if you don't relate to the content, you still have to understand that it's other people's reality.

R.F. Kuang | Waterstones

Oops. This is very ranty. Anyway, some of the reviewers feel bad for June, but I don't. I think she gets exactly what is coming to her. June Hayward only has one other author friend: Athena Liu, a young, successful, Chinese American author who’s found all the success in literature that June can only dream of. Then one day, while celebrating Athena’s upcoming Netflix deal, she chokes to death right in front of her. June is left with her only friend’s corpse and the first draft of Athena’s latest manuscript, which no one but her knows about.Sustaining the fraud in the eye of the storm requires ever more manic deception – and self-deception. After all, didn’t Juniper simply midwife a far-from-ready draft that might otherwise never have seen daylight? And in the first place, hadn’t Athena once strip-mined sensitive details of Juniper’s personal life for an early short story? And it’s so hard for white writers to catch a break these days… But as evidence threatens June’s stolen success, she will discover exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves. RFK is a fantastic writer and skillfully navigates the loneliness and pressure authors feel, making the drastic decisions juniper makes feel somewhat morally grey rather than outright wrong (as we know plagiarism is). and even though its done in a satirical way (which isnt my favourite), i enjoyed the exploration of topics like authors in reader spaces, own voices stories, and the different standards and treatment of white vs minority authors.

Yellowface by R.F. Kuang | Goodreads

This book truly blew my mind. I was unable to put it down, yet also needed to take breaks due to the chaotic and anxiety-inducing experience of living within Juniper's mind. The character evokes strong emotions, including frustration towards her misogyny, blind ambition, and obnoxious justifications for her actions.I like to do my homework with films, especially Christopher Nolan’s films, as they so reward doing your homework. I read all the material that inspired Dunkirk before I saw it in 2017, and this time I had to read the Pulitzer prize-winning biography that inspired Oppenheimer. (My fiance and I also sat down to watch Tenet for the fourth time with graph paper and multicoloured pens so we could map out the various timelines, and I regret to admit that this was extremely fun.) American Prometheus adds rich context to many of the chance encounters, interpersonal relationships and courtroom drama scenes in Oppenheimer. 2. Fiction

Yellowface: A Novel Paperback – International Edition, May 16

this may not bother other readers, but i can’t help but side-eye it. she gets around it by having these criticisms be made by mouthpieces—that’s another thing about yellowface, by the way. so many mouthpieces. i don’t think this is a book where readers will get very attached to the characters, not just because the mc is an unreliable narrator, but because yellowface is more of a book where characters are tools that represent different things and perspectives and are meant to be grimly watched, observed and laughed at from above. which is mostly fun, until you start to distinguish between rfk’s mouthpieces a bit: which ones she represents more flatly and more caricatured, and the one she gives more nuanced paragraphs to, from under which i think I can make out the haze of her opinions. and i’m not fond of them all the time. A lot of you love The Poppy War. I like CC's take on why she doesn't. I've tried that series twice. I found it rather mediocre both times. What does colonialism do to a person? As a non-white person growing up in the States, and disliking it, what made me so interested in the UK as a child? Even now? And even more importantly, as a Vietnamese American, what made me so interested in France? And more so in recent years, China and Japan? It's a hard introspective look, to be sure. It all boils down to self-interest…If publishing is rigged, you might as well make sure it's rigged in your favor.’ Madelein L'Engle said, "You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children." If Rebbeca Kuang saw this quote, she must have mixed it up because she wrote this book as though it's meant for children who want to graduate to adult fiction.Let’s be clear: June is not a character that you will feel empathy for. She will not be redeemed, rooted for, or endeared by the end; however, watching her downfall is oddly satisfying in a way that I cannot quite explain. The insight into the process of releasing a book with a Big Five publisher is compelling and intriguing, and it’s, sadly, easy to see how something like this story could transpire. The beauty of this tale is no one is safe from criticism; Kuang makes it clear that there are various forms of privilege that transpire across lines of race, class, gender, etc., and every single character really has something to answer for.