Rémy Reads : Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

Scathing, provocative, and all too familiar. 

We are in the head of Juniper, a white Yale graduate and unremarkably competent  writer, who decides to finish her more successful Asian colleagues’s manuscript after she dies in a freak accident, and publish it as her own work with an updated last name that gives her an air of racial ambiguity. Sounds about white. 

I started listening and could hardly stop. There was simply no where to put it down. Like watching someone slip and slide down the street before they crash into a pile of garbage. Kuang accurately channels the voice of someone who would not consider themself racist but holds racist modes of thinking because of the society they live in. It's quite the slippery slope.

"Does inclusivity cause more racism?" "Who's to blame for tokenization?" "Why should authors be able to profit off the trauma of their affinity groups?" These are just a few of the queries this main character reckons with on her descent through literary hell.

If you are interested in insights on publishing, micro-aggressions, mild critique of white feminism, unhinged fuckery, and the ivory tower I recommend.  Quick Read.

Optional Movie pairing: newly released American Fiction (2023) which covers similars themes with much more heart from the Black perspective.