3.5 stars. Contemporary/literary fiction can be hit or miss for me, but this drew me in. The beginning starts with Kyoko, who I found to be the most compelling character. As the story moves along we get more into the other characters, whose stories are interesting, but not what I thought the focus was going to be. Because of this, the book starts off really strong but lagged for me around halfway through. The prose and form of this was so so good though and I loved Min’s writing style. I thought her discussions of racism and fetishization were a unique take (and gave what I thought Yellowface was going to).

I loved this one!! This was a very thought-provoking read about the fetishization of Asian women by white men. I especially loved how music played such a big role in this story.

This book was very unique and I loved how the complexity of relationships was presented.

It made me sad to learn that this will be published posthumously by the author’s daughter. I will add her first novel to my TBR and look up her essays.

Darkly funny, tender, and thoughtful. An unconventional love story of sorts -- all types of love -- and an excellent look at making art.

Thanks to Netgalley for the advance copy.

I really wasn’t sure what to think about this book. I liked the kidnapping and the three different perspectives. I feel like I learned a little bit more about how Asian women can fetishized.

I think the reason I wouldn’t recommend it was because the amount of sex. It was necessary for the story but as a librarian I tend to stay away from that graphic of sex in my regular recommendations because I don’t know how patrons will feel.

"The Fetishist" by Katherine Min is a haunting and evocative novel that explores the intricate layers of identity, culture, and desire. Set against the backdrop of postwar Korea and 1960s New York, Min's narrative follows the life of its complex protagonist, Haru, as he grapples with personal demons and societal expectations. The novel delves into the shadows of the human psyche, addressing themes of trauma, obsession, and the search for belonging. Min's lyrical prose and rich character development create a mesmerizing reading experience. "The Fetishist" is a powerful and thought-provoking work that lingers in the mind, challenging conventional notions of self and society.

Wow! Such a powerful, page-turner about a young woman wanting to take revenge on the man who caused her mother to commit suicide. The story alternates between the past and present weaving in music, "yellow fever," MS and love.

This book is a painful reminder of the unjust treatment that so many Asian women, including my mother, have faced. However, it is a necessary read for those who seek to understand the struggles and inequalities they have endured.

The Fetishist was an absolutely wild ride and I could not put it down! I perpetually didn't know where it was going, in the best way. I loved the way Min interwove flashbacks and perspectives of various characters. It didn't feel forced or clunky at all.

I saw a lot of hate for Emi's character in other reviews, but she was clearly suffering and quite mentally ill--I wish other reviewers would chill! Alma was definitely my favorite, but Kyoko and Kornell were great too, and I was pleasantly surprised by how much I didn't hate the Daniel redemption arc in the end. I don't think the story about Gracie Han added much in the final pages, though.

The acknowledgements from Min's daughter were beautiful. I love how this book because a collaboration between Min and her daughter posthumously <3 Would highly recommend this book! It's very well written and well worth your time.

A painful book, but one that is necessary.

Written about a daughter's revenge for a mother's death, at the hands of a man who treated all asian women as a fetish, this strikes a cord within me. The anger that burns deep inside of me when I've seen men give my mom a second glance. The rage that boils when I've heard a whisper between two men in the aisle of a store. It's one that I understand.

This is a book that hurts to read but that was needed. It's painful that Katherine Min is not here anymore to give us more, but how blessed are we that we have this.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

𝑵𝒐𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝑲𝒚𝒐𝒌𝒐 𝒉𝒂𝒅 𝒓𝒆𝒈𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒅 𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒎𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓’𝒔 𝒅𝒆𝒂𝒕𝒉 𝒂𝒔 𝒂 𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒄𝒓𝒆𝒕𝒆 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏𝒕, 𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒆𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒕 𝒂 𝒑𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒄𝒖𝒍𝒂𝒓 𝒎𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕. 𝑰𝒏𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒂𝒅, 𝒊𝒕 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒂𝒔 𝒊𝒇 𝒆𝒂𝒄𝒉 𝒎𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕 𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒏 𝒉𝒂𝒅 𝒃𝒆𝒆𝒏 𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒑𝒐𝒖𝒏𝒅𝒆𝒅 𝒐𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏𝒕, 𝒂𝒄𝒄𝒓𝒖𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒓𝒐𝒖𝒏𝒅 𝒊𝒕, 𝒔𝒐 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒎𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓’𝒔 𝒅𝒆𝒂𝒕𝒉 𝒇𝒆𝒍𝒕 𝒐𝒏𝒈𝒐𝒊𝒏𝒈, 𝒂𝒍𝒘𝒂𝒚𝒔, 𝒊𝒏𝒔𝒊𝒅𝒆 𝒂 𝒔𝒘𝒐𝒍𝒍𝒆𝒏 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒆𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒏𝒂𝒍 𝒑𝒓𝒆𝒔𝒆𝒏𝒕, 𝒊𝒏 𝒘𝒉𝒊𝒄𝒉 𝑲𝒚𝒐𝒌𝒐 𝒔𝒂𝒕, 𝒊𝒏 𝒂 𝒃𝒖𝒕𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒅 𝒆𝒅𝒈𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒔𝒖𝒏𝒍𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕 𝒐𝒏 𝒑𝒂𝒍𝒆 𝒃𝒍𝒖𝒆 𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒐𝒍𝒆𝒖𝒎, 𝒔𝒎𝒐𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒎𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓’𝒔 𝒏𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕𝒈𝒐𝒘𝒏 𝒅𝒐𝒘𝒏 𝒂𝒓𝒐𝒖𝒏𝒅 𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒉𝒊𝒑𝒔.

Daniel is a dirty cheat with a fetish for Asian women, who left Japanese punk rock singer Kyoko’s mother Emmie dead on a pale blue linoleum floor. Kyoko’s grief has mutated into a hatred so deep and pure that she has turned assassin. She has decided it’s the perfect evening for Daniel Karmody to die and no one will suspect this blue-haired, 5’3, adorable twenty-three-year old of her intent. She waits in the shadows and then, much like her mother’s life, he ruins her plan and adds insult to injury unbeknownst to him by who he has with him. It solidifies her resolve further. Her heart is burning with revenge, and she will have it.

Kornel works long hours at a Japanese restaurant, grueling but he loves it. He will do anything to protect Kyoko, even if it means getting tangled in her scheme to take Karmody down. Despite his intimidating size, 6’3, 293 pounds, a black man, he is more gentle giant than a threat to anyone but he is loyal to her. If she wants Karmody punished, then so be it, but maybe he can control the outcome. Keep her from ending up in prison.

Far away is Alma, beautiful, Korean American cello prodigy, and the love of Daniel’s life, fighting a disease and desperate to end it all. As her illness ravages her physically, stopping her from her obsession (her cello playing) she has her own plan to end her own suffering, but like Kyoko’s madcap scheme, her own goes awry leaving her stewing in painful memories of the past. Daniel thrived after whetting his appetite with her, getting his “Asian fix”. Seeing photos of him with his string quartet on the internet, her gaze lands on an asian violinist, naturally she imagines they are sleeping together. How dare he have his health, success, and his ‘viking’ bride. Surely none of that is stopping him from fulfilling his carnal desires for all things Asian. Alma has her good friend Rickey, who loves her to pieces, but has she ever been loved as a woman?

Daniel is soon trapped in a nightmare when he is abducted, confused as to why at first, but he has a lot of time to ponder the reason for his current predicament, his past and try and fight his way out by building a weapon among his victim’s things. Was Kyoko’s mother truly a victim? Is Daniel to blame for her death? Is he an evil fetishist? What about the women he has had, could they have a fetish for white men? Is he the monster Kyoko imagines him to be? Will she end him before he faces painful truths about himself?

Daniel and Alma are both suspended in a moment miles and miles apart, rehashing their love and pain, still thinking of each other. Will Daniel be dead before he and Alma make peace with the past? Will Kornel truly go against his nature and let Kyoko see her plan through to the bitter end?

This was a beautifully written, original tale. It isn’t about fetishism alone, it is about how we treat the people and things we desire, how our love or lack of it subtracts or adds to the lives of others. It is a question of who has power, and how we see the subject of our longing. Is Kyoko’s rage justified? It is a love story, too, in reverse with misunderstandings all around. I was captivated by the idea of fetishism, where is the line? Can you control your desires, your leanings towards a type? Are women always just objects for a man’s hunger? Alma certainly has power, she is no weakling, and Daniel loves her, of that there is no doubt. Is fetishizing acceptable if love is genuine?

Provocative, sad, and yet filled with humorous moments that had me laughing. I also understood Kyoko’s perspective, rage, and misguided lust for revenge. Yes, read it!

Publication Date: January 9 2024

Penguin Group

Putnam, G.P. Putnam’s Sons

I was initially drawn to this novel because of the cover, title, and the fact that it was published posthumously. I didn’t know what all i was getting myself into! The story follows Daniel (the fetishist himself), his ex girlfriend, and the daughter of another of his ex girlfriends. We jump between past tense and present day, at which point Daniel is kidnapped.

This book is fast paced and pretty short! I felt that end was a little rushed. I found the sex scenes to be unnecessarily graphic, but that’s a personal preference. I liked the commentary on race and would be curious to know if the story was influenced by the authors own experience! Overall I would rate this 3/5 and recommend it to someone looking for a quick, mysterious read!

The Fetishist by Katherine Min was one of the strangest stories I’ve ever read. If I could describe this with a couple of words they would be “strange regret”. I couldn’t focus on just one person and where it was going. The more I read the worse I felt. There was some resolution at the end but overall struggled with the entire novel. It was sad and convoluted.
3⭐️
Thanks Penguin Group Putnam via NetGalley.

At the center of the story is Daniel, an aging violinist and the titular (white, male) fetishist, who almost exclusively dates/sleeps with women of Asian descent. We also jump into the life of Kyoko, a Japanese-American punk singer, and her boyfriend Kornell, a sweet Black man and drummer who works in a Japanese restaurant. Kyoko blames philandering Daniel for her mother's death, kidnaps him, and keeps him imprisoned in a basement. Meanwhile, Daniel's ex-wife Alma, a Korean-American cellist with fiery charisma and MS, attempts suicide and falls into a coma.

Daniel's and Alma's twin imprisonments of the body allow the reader to follow their minds' meanderings. They remember past relationships, including each other, and are brought together at the end for a kind of reconciliation.

Really acute, punchy writing, packed with powerful observations about life, death, and love. The plot was fast paced with some very short chapters here and there that I appreciated--the book was eager to jump ahead to keep the pace. However, the action still lagged in the book's midsection, when we're primarily awash in backstory.

Interesting to note that this is published posthumously with the help of Katherine Min's daughter, as Min switched to (wonderful!) essay-writing towards the end of her life.

Smart, funny, touching, sad, observant, and ultimately, full of redemption and empathy.

Thank you to NetGalley and G.P. Putnam's Sons for sending me an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts:

Backed by Alexander Chee and Cathy Park Hong, this savage and sharp novel examines the colonist and his yellow-fever appetite. We get revenge, lust, and kidnapping, all in wry fashion.

Is the question:

Why does the colonizer continue to colonize?

Or

Why does the colonized continue to submit to the colonizer?

Though it feels uneven in portions as I feel Min is a better short story writer than a novelist, her writing shines through in character study and interactions, which I think moves the plot along just fine. The chapter headers and the way the story moves in parts feels done haphazardly (which I think this could've been smoothed out in editing).

Published posthumously, it still feels like it was trapped in the third or fourth draft as it remains surface-level in its tensions and heavy-handed in the way the characters are fleshed out. It's a shame we lost Min too quickly as I feel like this would've been an incredible and timely novel if she were still here.

I will leave you with this note:

The book ends with a side-eye, but with much surprise. We get the classic "Asian school lunch scene" from an awkward Asian teen Gracie with her Caucasian lover, Daniel. I was going to make a loud scoff over this, but Min surprises us with character exploration, allowing Daniel to pick up Gracie's retainer and have him slip it in his mouth, tasting her, tasting what she tastes. It's in these moments, intimate moments, that I think Min's work shines through with much tenderness, vulnerability, and surprise.

Because as much as we think we know who we know and who we love, they still come with much surprise.

THIS BOOK! OMG! To find out that this novel is being published posthumously was absolutely heart wrenching.
“The Fetishist” is an incredibly meaningful and somewhat violent exploration into the way white men fetishize and abuse Asian women and their respective cultures. I would recommend this novel to anyone and everyone. It is clear that the author wrote from a place of pain and turned it into an incredible work of fiction. #netgalley #thefetishist

Thank you NetGalley andG.P. Putnam’s Sons for an eARC in exchange for an honest review!

4.5 stars!

When I first came across The Fetishist, I had very little clue what it was about. It was recommended to me on NetGalley, but I was intrigued by the title and the cover. I’m really glad that I picked this up, because I enjoyed it a lot and was super engrossed while reading.

This is about Daniel, who is the titular fetishist and kind of a loser; Kyoko, a singer in a punk rock band with some violent desires; and Alma, a former cellist who is currently living with MS. At first, I was unsure how all of their threads would come together, but they do in interesting ways (sort of in the way where you can’t stop looking at a car crash/train wreck, because wow these people are messy) and at times this is super funny in an absurdist kind of way. All three are drawn together by music (which was a fun throughline) and while it’s quite easy to tell which part of the story you’re in, there is a “past” and a “future” woven throughout, and it’s cool to see the ways their lives have intersected. I found this to be really compelling, especially considering the themes it approached. The title of this book comes from the fact it’s exploring the fetishization of East Asian women by white men, and I think it does this quite well, for the most part. There are also parts where the writing is toeing the line of being fetishistic (Kyoko, for example, is described as being small a multitude of times), but I think these contribute to the overall exploration Min is going for.

I enjoyed the narrative voice for this a lot. It’s omniscient, but the best way I can describe it is as being omniscient in the way the narration for Desperate Housewives is. I mean, okay, no one died and is narrating the lives of her former neighbors, but the overall vibe is… similar, I think. It’s fun! I enjoyed how short the chapters were, though it might be more accurate to say it’s a collection of vignettes that tell an overarching story. The voice and writing in this are just so good, it was worth reading just for that.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the end. I think it was cathartic and I really liked how some characters ended up, but there was one for whom I feel things worked out a little too easily. I’m not mad about it, because I think I can see what Min is going for, but I knocked the half star off for it, because I’m just not sure that character should’ve had their story end that way (though maybe I just wanted to see them grovel!). There’s a lot to chew on here, though, and regardless of me feeling a little bit “hmmm” about one aspect of the ending, it was a fascinating read.

Overall, I had a blast reading this and found it clever and engaging! Highly recommend.

Min manages to create a story that feels very unique based on some themes that have been well explored: the fetishization of Asian heritage women, the world of classical music, aging, the one that got away, revenge… and this uniqueness deserves attention. Often funny and sometimes absurd, this was an entertaining read.

I was disappointed that Kornell and Kyoko feel thin when compared with Alma and Daniel, and the way that redemption is offered for the man that fetishizes women feels dated. However, these elements, while annoying, do not detract too much from a read that is entertaining and often surprising.

The Acknowledgements state that Min passed away prior to the release of this book, which is too bad, she deserved to know the praise her work will surely receive.

I came here for one thing, and that was the murder of a fetishist. And she had the audacity to give this man a redemption arc???

The first 70% was so compelling though. 2 stars for the writing and initial developing plotline.

A posthumous novel is a very poignant thing.

I chose to try this because I like a revenge story. Main character Kyoko kidnaps a guy and keeps him in a basement because she is convinced that he is responsible for her mother's death. Which he (sort of) is.

For me, there was a little bit too much basement captivity, but there were a lot of other interesting elements: classical music, the fetishization of Asian woman, morally gray characters.

Original and a little out-there, The Fetishist won't be for everyone but it's worth trying.

Katherine Min's writing style drew me in from page one. She elegantly crafts the story of Daniel, Alma, and Kyoko, whose lives are intertwined and unwind to tragedy and fulfillment at various points along the way. She confronts race head on, pressing the reader to awareness of his own bias and consideration. Misuse of selfish pleasures is another theme that enters the scene. I really enjoyed reading this book. It will be published in January 2024. Add it to your list!

Thank you Netgalley and G.P. Putnam's Sons for my advance egalley!