R.F. Kuang’s “Yellowface” is what happens when satire isn’t satirical at all

In his 2011 song “Over My Dead Body,” Drake describes the doubt people had about his ability to maintain his momentum as a popular artist. As a response to the uncertainty he heard surrounding his career, Drake pointed out that the doubters were simply jealous and “Jealousy is just love and hate at the same time.” And no one is more jealous than June Hayward, the narrator and main character of R.F. Kuang’s book “Yellowface.”

While searching for a book in the library, the bright yellow cover and bold title of  “Yellowface” immediately drew me to it.  I vaguely remembered hearing about the book on TikTok but knew little to nothing about the madness it contained within its pages. 

The 2023 bestseller follows June Hayward, a struggling writer, who is eager to prove her talent by writing a bestselling book and what she will do to get there. June is jealous of her friend Athena Liu who she met in college. After graduating, both women published their first manuscripts at the same time.

June’s manuscript faded to the background while Athena’s became beloved by the publishing community, launching her into literary fame. Though they were never very close, after college they still remained in touch and hung out from time to time.

One night after hanging out, the girls go back to Athena’s apartment. Athena shows June her next manuscript that she has been working on and tells her she is the only person that knows about it. Later that night, Athena chokes to death in front of June while they were having a pancake eating competition.

After calling the police, June steals Athena’s secret manuscript on her way out of the apartment. Athena’s manuscript was about Chinese labor workers during World War I. June immediately gets to work on editing the draft, and soon begins to feel ownership of it. When she submits the manuscript, she is immediately welcomed by the publishing community that previously shut her out.

In order to better hide her tracks, June exaggerates her and Athena’s friendship to explain why the writing might sound like Athena. June also changes her name for the book, at the encouragement of her new publishing team, from “June Hayward” to “Juniper Song.” The name is intentionally more racially ambiguous, so at first glance readers would think June was Asian, therefore qualified to write about that topic.

For the rest of the book, I watched June go through cartoonish hoops to keep her lie a secret. She lies to and manipulates everyone around her, including Athena’s grieving mother. She manages to silence those who were skeptical of her, all while justifying her horrific actions to herself. At one point, she even considered murder to help cover up her lie.

Eventually June becomes so wrecked by the guilt she feels from lying, that she starts seeing Athena’s ghost. June’s lies do manage to catch up with her, but in the end June has become so deranged that she doesn’t care. 

While reading this book, I felt like Kuang had her hand on the pulse of society. The social commentary on topics like book culture, publishing and social media all felt very accurate to real life, which is scary considering this book is supposed to be satire. From the insensitive comments made by literary agents to the aggressive dissecting of June’s whole being on social media, it all seemed too real. 

June is what made the book interesting. Like Drake said, she hated Athena viscerally for her success but loved her at the same time because of that same success. June definitely was a villain, but it wasn’t pure evil that motivated her. She genuinely believed she deserved Athena’s success, often undermining it by chalking it up to Athena’s race and society’s newfound love of diversity. 

Though this book came out two years ago, the topics surrounding diversity are more relevant than ever. Kuang poses several questions that have complicated answers: Who gets to tell what stories? Is research enough to qualify someone to produce art about experiences they’ve never had? 

I think June’s status as an unreliable narrator strengthens the questions that Kuang asks. It allows for the audience to attempt to answer those questions themselves rather than have the answers spoon fed to us by a reliable narrator. It’s been a few months since I first read this book and I can say that I still don’t have any answers. 

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Kuang’s balance of humor and intensity is what really made this book stand out to me. Her writing was simple and direct while simultaneously carrying loads of meaning. Kuang’s satirical look at the publishing industry, plagiarism and book culture in the era of social media, is well written and intriguing from beginning to end.