When star author Athena Liu dies suddenly, June Hayward pockets her latest manuscript, about Chinese laborers, and then rewrites it and releases it under the name “Juniper Song” (her first and middle names). When the book becomes a smash success, June is accused of misleading people into thinking she might have Chinese ancestry, and finds herself haunted by Athena’s ghost wherever she turns. The book raises questions about racism in the publishing industry, diversity as performance, and ownership in art, but immerses it all in June’s inescapable trainwreck of an unreliable first-person narrative. There is barely a single likeable character in this book but it moves along incredibly well.
One thought on “Yellowface, by R.F. Kuang”