(book review)

Rebecca Kuang’s Yellowface is a thought-provoking exploration of identity, privilege, and the ethical dilemmas of authorship in the literary world. A sharp departure from Kuang’s historical fantasy roots, this contemporary literary thriller takes readers into the competitive and often brutal world of publishing, unraveling questions of cultural appropriation, integrity, and morality.

The novel begins with a shocking incident: Athena Liu, a celebrated Chinese-American author, dies suddenly in a freak accident. June Hayward, a white writer struggling with her faltering career, impulsively steals Athena’s unpublished manuscript. Rebranding herself as Juniper Song, June publishes the stolen work as her own, passing off Athena’s distinctly Asian narrative as her personal creation. What follows is a fascinating and chilling descent into deceit, self-justification, and paranoia as June wrestles with her stolen success and the mounting scrutiny of her identity.

Kuang masterfully captures the intricacies of the publishing industry—the suffocating pressure to stand out, the relentless commodification of diverse stories, and the uneasy line between cultural appreciation and exploitation. Through June, Kuang creates an unreliable narrator who is both disturbingly relatable and deeply flawed. Her justifications for her theft and her blind spots about privilege reveal uncomfortable truths about how the literary world values—and undervalues—certain voices.

What sets Yellowface apart is Kuang’s biting satire and her ability to dissect complex themes without ever veering into heavy-handedness. The book critiques performative allyship, tokenism, and the ways in which systemic inequities persist in ostensibly progressive spaces. Yet, Kuang also balances this critique with razor-sharp humor and moments of self-awareness, making the story as entertaining as it is provocative.

Stylistically, Kuang’s prose is crisp and engaging, with an immediacy that draws readers into June’s unraveling psyche. The narrative’s pace is relentless, mirroring the dizzying highs and lows of June’s rise and fall in the public eye. Kuang also embeds meta-commentary about the ethics of storytelling, asking who gets to tell certain stories and at what cost.

Yellowface is not just a story about plagiarism; it’s a mirror held up to an industry and society that frequently grapples with issues of authenticity, representation, and power dynamics. It forces readers to confront uncomfortable questions: What are the boundaries of art and ownership? Can talent justify theft? And what does it mean to truly deserve success?

In the end, Yellowface is as much about the reader as it is about June or Athena. It challenges us to interrogate our own biases, our consumption of stories, and the systems we support. It’s a searing, unflinching novel that lingers long after the final page—a must-read for anyone interested in the complexities of modern storytelling.

Rebecca Kuang has once again proven her versatility and brilliance, delivering a novel that is both a page-turner and a powerful cultural critique. My rating is 9/10.