Yellowface
R.F. Kuang, 2023
Graphic novels & humour Contemporary fictionLiterary fiction
A scalpel-sharp satire of publishing: a jealous writer steals a dead friend's manuscript and learns who gets to tell which stories. A nervy, fast first-person voice that pulls you into envy, ambition and bad decisions, with a satirical bite that stays sharp and often funny.
Feels like curiosity and serenity. About power, ambition and identity.
Who it’s for
You may enjoy this if you like unreliable narrators and fiction about writers and publishing. Be warned that the narrator's constant self-justifying can wear thin, and the book is deliberately uncomfortable about race and theft rather than comforting.
Why read it
It gives you a close, uncomfortable look at who gets to tell which stories, and how envy works on a person who keeps telling herself she is fine.
A page from the book
The particular hell of watching everyone else succeed while you're still writing.
Every writer I know feels this way about someone else. Writing is such a solitary activity. You have no assurance that what you’re creating has any value, and any indication that you’re behind in the rat race sends you spiraling into the pits of despair. Keep your eyes on your own paper, they say. But that’s hard to do when everyone else’s papers are flapping constantly in your face. R.F. Kuang.R.F. Kuang is a Chinese-American writer best known for the Poppy War fantasy trilogy; Yellowface is her first contemporary novel and a #1 New York Times bestseller.
Books that feel like this
Where to get it
Some of these links earn us a small commission, at no cost to you. It keeps BookFeed free.
Questions readers ask
- Is Yellowface for me?
- You may enjoy this if you like unreliable narrators and fiction about writers and publishing. Be warned that the narrator's constant self-justifying can wear thin, and the book is deliberately uncomfortable about race and theft rather than comforting.
- What is Yellowface like?
- A nervy, fast first-person voice that pulls you into envy, ambition and bad decisions, with a satirical bite that stays sharp and often funny. Feels like curiosity and serenity. About power, ambition and identity.
- What should I read after Yellowface?
- If you liked Yellowface, try Storm Front (Jim Butcher), The Devil Wears Prada (Lauren Weisberger) and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Sherman Alexie).
A taste of the feed
What paranoia looks like when it keeps being proved right.
Paranoid? Probably. But just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean that there isn’t an invisible demon about to eat your face.
Storm Front · Jim Butcher
What poverty actually teaches, from someone who sat through the lesson.
Poverty doesn’t give you strength or teach you lessons about perseverance. No, poverty only teaches you how to be poor.
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian · Sherman Alexie
What a pot of cabbage can make a person promise.
Coriolanus released the fistful of cabbage into the pot of boiling water and swore that one day it would never pass his lips again.
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes · Suzanne Collins
Read pages from books like this, one at a time
Keep reading in the feed