▫️Yolk | Fiction
▫️Author: Mary H.K. Choi @choitotheworld
▫️My rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
▫️Pub Date: March 2, 2021
TRIGGER WARNINGS: Eating Disorders, Mental health issues, cancer, illness
Jayne and June are sisters, despite their shared blood they could not be more dissimilar. Living just blocks away from each other in New York City they have carved disparate lives but are forced to weave each other back into their worlds when June is diagnosed with Cancer. Jayne is left to confront her history when her sister’s future becomes unstable.
Taking on the responsibility of her sole carer she learns more than she ever thought she could about her sister and herself, it becomes clear that June might not be the only one who is suffering. Choi’s writing felt incredibly fresh (we even had a Sally Rooney reference thrown in for good measure) and nuanced, balancing the gut wrenching and wittier moments really beautifully.
I particularly enjoyed her exploration of the sister’s upbringing with Korean parents living in America - what it was like to be a restaurant kid, to have extremely heavy pressure put onto them for success and the importance of food in relationships. I did struggle with the pacing of this book though, finding myself urging for the plot to unravel with a bit more urgency. The flicking back and forth of time also felt disjointed at times with it not always being the easiest of books to follow.
This book provides a lot to unpack and it was very refreshing to see a sister relationship at the forefront of a novel.
Reviewed by Megan Raynor