Reviews

initially disturbing, this novel became an odd and meandering journey through identity and meaning. it’s often uncomfortable but the end was worth the means

ele_walton's review

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dark medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I don't have to think hard about whether I liked this book. The answer is no, I found the intentionally dense and baroque prose so irritating at times that it was physically painful.

I also don't have to think hard about whether it was interesting. The answer is yes, very much so. This is a book about K-pop and fandom (despite Yi's own claim to the Center for Fiction that "Not once have I thought of Y/N as being about K-pop or fandom;" on a plot events level it objectively is) and more broadly about the relationship between the viewer and the artist, the lover and the beloved, the artist and the imagined construction, the believer and the religion. Yi blends all these together to question where any one of these roles begins and ends. The unnamed narrator being a fanfiction writer is necessary to the work, because it means she is both analyzing K-pop idol Moon's constructed persona and herself creating him by interpreting him into a distinct fictionalized character. So is Yi.

Moon isn't who she thinks, of course, and she eventually pleads, "I want you to be Moon," the same desire the narrator recoiled from when Lise, another fan who willfully mistook the narrator for Moon, wished for her to play along. All the lovers in the book play some form of this game, as do a group of dementia patients and their relatives. Instead of the narrator's lovers Masterson and Oseol knowing her, they love the version of her that exists only in their minds. The daughter of one dementia patient recognizes her father despite knowing he no longer recognizes himself, while another patient repeatedly mistakes other characters for her younger brother, recognizing him in them simply because she wishes to see him. Ultimately, all these projections of love and recognition only reflect each viewer's own personality and desires, all of them fixating on imagined characters. As the book goes on, the narrator feels increasingly certain that no other form of connection exists, and, lonelier than ever, longs to physically merge with Moon into a single body.

Y/N fanfiction is one of a very few forms of writing that explicitly asks the reader to imagine themself as the protagonist. The narrator of this novel is necessarily nameless, because if I participate and Y/N is me then I am necessarily also the narrator--even though, as she discovers in the book's early chapters, this means "my" biography and personality are all wrong, fitting as uncomfortably as when another person tells me something about their perception of me that doesn't fit how I see myself. And the narrator isn't an everywoman--she's just universal. I have seen this book described as a satire of the hobby cultures she participates in, but I cannot agree. Her obsession is comedic, pathetic, and extreme at times, but never does the text suggest that there is something wrong with her for wanting or seeking human connection and artistic fulfillment. The celebrity crush is not separated from viable dates, the fanfiction is not separated from professional or fine art. They are all presented as potential outlets for devotion. That's really what Y/N is about, thematically. How do we imagine our way out of loneliness?

It's very beautiful, and fascinating, and I wish I felt like recommending this book, but I truly found the sentences so maddening to read a few times that I had to walk away. This is going to be a matter of taste. Personally, I vacillated between feeling like BaalBuddy's barely literate ogre (who feels dumb for only identifying surface themes of Joyce) and pulling a Miranda Priestly-ish skeptical face. Seoul, sole, and soul sound alike? Groundbreaking.

This might be for you. You have to go into it because you want to read a surreal philosophical literary work. Picturing a funny book about a fanfic writer trying to meet her favorite K-pop star will put you in the wrong neighborhood of expectations, even though all those words are true.