“Only I don’t know what it is I want to say anymore. I don’t know if I ever did. And I’m terrified that the only thing I’ll ever be remembered for, and the only method by which I can produce good work, is slipping on someone else’s skin.”
Powered by an unreliable and unlikeable narrator, "Yellowface" delves into themes of plagiarism, cultural identity, loneliness, and the horrors of social media. R.F. Kuang's story is at its best when it navigates the perils and hypocrisies of the publishing world, exposing dirty industry secrets.
“We have one of those skin-deep friendships where you manage to spend a lot of time together without really getting to know the other person.”
I have also read Kuang's "Babel," and I was a little surprised at some of the repetition in phrasing and overall laziness that seemed to drag this book down.
“I looked like I was trying to hold in a sneeze, or like I had to take a shit but was too afraid to tell anyone.”
The main character, Juniper Song, bends over backwards to justify plagiarism, which a reader may end up hoping is unironically just part of the book's bent. She also ends up denigrating the secondary character, Athena, in order to make her own sins more palatable.
The novel struggles with seeming shortcuts in certain storylines and an unwillingness to explore the external life of Juniper, which renders her one-dimensional and robs the narrative of depth. "Yellowface" chooses an intriguing and important premise, but may elide too much in a rush to bring the story full circle.
“I’d somehow absorbed all the directness and verve of Athena’s writing. I felt, as Kanye put it, harder, better, faster, and stronger. I felt like the kind of person who now listened to Kanye.”
