YOLK is by a fantastic YA author Mary H. K. Choi, but this book is not the light-hearted fare you might expect. It's heavy and serious, very character driven with not too much plot, and it is often times heartbreaking. We follow Jayne, a Korean-American college girl in NYC coming to terms with an eating disorder, bad choices with boys, and a distant sister who was recently diagnosed with cancer. Choi embodies the experience of a being a child of Asian immigrants in realistic, straightforward, and humorous ways. And while I don't have a sister, I feel the relationship between Jayne and June could not be more true to life - they sometimes hate each other but in the end, there is no stronger love story in their lives than the one they have for each other.

The only reason this isn't a 5-star read for me is that I wanted a little more story to the book. Being in Jayne's head was often hard at times, and it made me not want to pick it up very often (I also had a very busy and anxiety-producing week, so that may have been a part of it!) But the characters were true to life, and you'll leave only wanting what is best for Jayne and her sister. In some ways the end wraps up in too neat a bow, but in others, we are left only hoping things work out in the end. The book is complex, nuanced, and often a revelation. Choi, as always, gives us a gift of a book and continues to set herself apart in the world of YA publishing.

CW: disordered eating, body dysmorphia, bulimia, cancer, female fertility, parental abandonment, child loss

This book was heavy. Much more heavy than I anticipated and on so many levels. First off, let me say that Mary H.K. Choi is a true wordsmith and her words are always well crafted. I think she is such a strong writer and I love that she writes about topics that aren’t easy. What I loved about this book was the familial aspect, specifically the sibling relationship.

This book was specifically hard for me and I know the blurb alludes to some issues, I wasn’t sure exactly what it was- major tw for ED... it was just really hard for me. I wanted to love it, it was well written and impactful, but it wasn’t my favorite from Choi and was just too difficult for these too close to home topics.

In her newest young adult #ownvoices novel, Mary H.K. Choi writes about two Korean-American sisters struggling to cope with individual illnesses. As Choi discusses in a Refinery29 interview, Yolk delves into the “shame around illness, the idea that being sick is a ‘moral failure,’ and that talking about it is even worse—a plea for attention.” Combining descriptive, poetic prose with authentically flawed characters, Choi’s book is an emotional rollercoaster that invites readers to dive in at least once.
[full review in link below]

Jayne and June Baek are sisters living in New York, but are great at avoiding each other and are complete polar opposites, that is, until June is diagnosed with uterine cancer. Jayne must confront that living in New York and going to fashion school is not all she dreamed it would be--with a mooch ex-situationship, fair-weather friends, living with anxiety and an eating disorder, and wanting to be the effervescent glam she always presents.

This book is written in first-person from Jayne's perspective and she is not the most likeable character! However, she was understandable and relatable. Mark Choi has created very flawed and multi-faceted characters who were, at times, endearing, frustrating, and cringe-y. When there were times I was frustrated with Jayne, something would happen that would raise my empathy for her. The narrative also describes the immigrant experience--Jayne and her family immigrated from Korea to Texas--in learning English, wanting to assimilate to the people around them (without losing their own identity...except Jayne...), and the cultural differences when it comes to parenting and critiquing. I loved the tumultuous relationship between Jayne and June as well as the relationship they have with their mom--it was realistic and heart-breaking. I appreciated that there was a hopeful, open-ended resolution.

This was a very well written book. I've read one of Choi's other YA novels and loved it. I didn't love this one as much, but what I do appreciate about it is its unflinching portrayal of a teen struggling with mental health (eating disorder), with family issues, and with not feeling at home in her own skin. Choi's writing is so vivid and honest that it feels like I'm reading a non-fiction story, that Jayne and June are real people I could go out and meet.

I think there are many teens who will identify with this story and characters, which means I will definitely be recommending this book. It's definitely a "new adult" story, however, so I will definitely preface this by saying that it does include alcohol, drugs, and sexual situations.

Overview: Jayne is in fashion school in NYC. Well, she's enrolled. It's debatable how often she actually attends. June has a fancy job in finance, or that's what everyone thinks. But when June gets cancer, the estranged sisters are pulled together because June needs Jayne's identity to get treatment. By pretending to be her sister to get the life-saving procedure, June is forced to come clean and pull Jayne back into her orbit. Though their relationship stays rocky, they're suddenly glued together, forced to admit that their respective glamorous lives are actually filled with roaches and trauma and missteps. Overall: 5+++

This book made me happy cry (that's never happened while reading) and sad cry.

Characters: 5 The book is told from Jayne's perspective in an extremely close first person. This book has plot. Things happen in the way that life happens, but it's mostly just characters getting split open and probed for all their worth. You become intimately acquainted with the way Jayne's brain works. How it maybe works similar to yours in some ways. Jayne has been through a lot. She always felt rejected or like she was never enough for her mother. She wanted to be cool, and her older sister was the opposite of that, so they were driven apart during their high school years in Texas. None of the men she's dated- or at least hooked up with- have treated her well. She's come to expect to be mistreated by friends and others who come into her life. She tried partying to escape her brain, to find a semblance of community, but that just left her blurry and even sadder. And when all else fails, she copes with the nauseous swirl of life through her eating disorder that's been slowly biting away at her since high school. Jayne starts the book in a state where she's fully aware of how bad her situation is but also thoroughly unable to do anything to fix it. And that's not to say she's making excuses. Sometimes you just have to arrive at the point where you're ready to make a major change entirely on your own.

Jayne has an amazing evolution over the course of the book. She comes to terms with her family trauma, with all the unanswered questions. She slowly starts to understand her past and why her relationships are what they are. There's no huge reconciliation story, but it happens quietly. Everything in this book happens quietly, realistically. Similarly, Jayne learns she can be loved without being used in a quiet romantic arc that pops up in a truly healing, though still flawed, way throughout the book as a quiet murmur in the background.

While Jayne has always been popular- or at least too cool for her own good- June has always been the smart, sensible one. She graduated high school and went straight to Columbia. From there, she landed her job in finance. She has plenty of disposable income and lives in a fancy high-rise in the East Village. June looks like she's made it from the outside. On the inside, she's recently gotten fired, feels like her life is spiraling out of control, and is contending with a cancer diagnosis in her early 20s. June is proof that even when you look like you have it all it together, you can still be falling apart. You can still need help even when all you want to do is give help.

The other striking half of June's storyline is just the epitome of how horribly screwed up healthcare is in America. There's obviously the insurance issue after she loses her job that leads to the identity switch, but towards the end of the book, it's revealed that June has always suffered from excruciating periods that lead to traumatic bullying in high school when she'd bleed through her pants and cause issues at work when she frequently had to go to the bathroom to change her tampon. It caught me off guard and made me absolutely furious. Her story just accented how little the medical system helps people deal with issues around their periods and reproductive health and accented how the stigma around periods makes it even more unbearable to live with that kind of medical condition. Beyond that, on the topic of healthcare, there's a scene where June and Jayne are at a Dairy Queen in Texas and they park next to a van with a sign asking for a kidney donor. Jayne thinks about it, hoping they get their kidney but wondering why someone would agree to do that. I'm pretty sure we've all seen a sign like that and had a thought like Jayne, whether it was a sign on a car or a Go Fund Me page on Twitter. It was just another jab to the heart. And, finally, in the book Jayne repeatedly goes to therapy in an attempt to make progress on her anxiety and eating disorder. At a critical crisis moment for Jayne, her therapist that she's been seeing through her school insurance tells her that she's exceeded the 8 free sessions and will have to pay a steep co-pay to continue getting treatment. Cost prohibits so many people from getting the help they need, and that was particularly accented as the scene played out. We've been failed in so many ways, and that crushing reality is so quietly woven into the book through these characters' simple life experiences that it doesn't become crushing till the end.

There are so many characters that appear for a glimmer and others that are always quietly there in the background, like June and Jayne's parents. But the last character I want to talk about in particular is Patrick. He functions almost as a tiny glimmer of hope in the book as Jayne goes from stalks an old church friend's Instagram to find out he's turned into a cool creative director with a grad degree from Yale. He's the foil to her horrible on again-off again boyfriend who has moved into Jayne's illegally subletted apartment and won't leave. Patrick is mysterious and sophisticated and shows up on a dime to meet Jayne at a grimy dive bar. He's never invasive. He's gentle. He cooks for Jayne in his tiny apartment and loans her his sweats. He makes plenty of mistakes as all messy, messy people do, but he so clearly has a good heart. He's so clearly the proof Jayne needs that there are good, kind people in the world who can and will love her honestly. And the flickers of a new relationship that we witness are truly healing and beautiful, made even more so by the glimpses we get into Jayne's past.

Plot: 5 Like I said before, this book doesn't have much plot. There's a story arc for sure, and more than that, there are astounding character arcs, but it's not a plot driven story. At all. Mary has talked about that being a common thread in her books, and you either love it or hate it. I happen to love it. In the scenes where "nothing happens" Mary takes the time to intimately acquaint us with character's inner lives and ugly thoughts. We know every tiny detail of the world because the story isn't running on a bullet train. It moves at the pace of life. Some days are still and reflective, others chaotic. And Mary isn't shoving the book along faster to create a snappier plot. You have to be willing to totally live in her books to properly enjoy them. It's never a race to the big conclusion. And if you want a big conclusion- not the spoil anything- but that's not what you're getting here. As the book intimately mimics the tangles of life identically, the ending works much like life and allows you to choose your own conclusion. It's plenty satisfying, but there's no crowning moment where everyone is safe, the invader is gone, and the prince carries her off into the sunset. Though, for a book that's almost 400 pages about the uncertainty of life, a tidy ending would almost feel like a betrayal.

Writing: 5 Mary H.K. Choi is my favorite author for a reason (and I don't hand that title out lightly). Her books are like nothing else in YA. They're not even really YA. There's a coming of age, but her characters tend to be older, living in the real world, reconciling their issues with their parents from a distance, in their own apartments wondering how they can fake being an adult a little longer. She fills a gap in both YA and adult like no one else. I beg publishing constantly for more books with YA centered conflict for 18-23 year olds. I hope they'll listen eventually.

The other thing that makes Mary so unique is that every word feels incredibly intentional without ever impacting the flow of the book or creating the foreboding sense of the "writer" hanging over the book. It's so cerebral and intense and intelligent. I kept taking pictures of passages that utterly blew me away. She articulates feelings I've never found words for myself, and she does this in little, throwaway sentences. I've never seen a writer make the tiny moments of life so fascinating without hyper-inflating them. She simply knows how to focus the microscope in a way that means her books don't need more embellishment. It's both effortless and meticulous. She captures the incredible nuances of people and places in a way I rarely see. She made me nostalgic for Texas, the place I grew up hating the whole time. She has the right inside jokes that will hit home for every current and former Texan, and she describes New York in a way that makes me ache for it and fear it. I was supposed to be there this year, and she makes me feel like I understand it a little more as I watch so many of my Zoom classmates run around that very city. I can't tell if Jayne is supposed to go to Parsons or FIT (they're both decently close together around the Union Square type area), but that also hit close to home. Mary inherently understands her subjects, and that comes through in a way you can't fake.

Finally, if you wanted to, you could call Yolk an "issue book". It's not marketed that way at all. There is an author's note warning about the possible emotional expense of the book, but it's never emphasized. The book talks about living with an eating disorder (in great detail) and being a survivor of sexual assault (to a lesser extent). I've read so many books about both topics, and it's so often done in a way that centralizes the trauma and makes it the only defining feature of the plot and the character dealing with it. The entire book exists under that purview. And while plenty of those books handle it well, I appreciate the way Yolk (and Emergency Contact too) handle it more.

It's not polarizing. It's only really a small part of the Jayne we know. It impacts her life and shapes her worldview, but these experiences exist in the story as they exist in the real people who have those lived experiences. It's one part of a multitude of facets. It's a glancing moment in a full person. And the way that both events are written about are thoroughly wrapped into the situation of the scene and through Jayne's feelings. It's not being thrust in some wider context or commentary about the world. It's not endlessly ruminated on, and it's not flashy. It's almost normal. And that's scary and hard to digest that so many people deal with some form of these traumas that it is normal. It's much easier to play it in a removed, stigmatized, scary way that's not connected to the million other things we deal with in a day.

Yolk gives you all of it all at once. And I also love Jayne's recovery story. There's a lot of struggling and bad choices. There is a breaking point with her eating disorder, but it's not cinematic, it's not romantic like some portrayals can be. It's also not instructive. Most of the portrayal of Jayne's eating disorder is simply a hum in the background, worried glances, and tiny details slipped into larger passages that hint at the severity. Jayne goes to therapy when she can, and her therapist isn't a perfect fit. Eventually, she tries an eating disorder support group, and it's awkward and uncomfortable and cringey in the way that all groups are. She's skeptical, but she's also been on the arc to be ready to try to be helped. To try to help herself. There are so many nuanced scenes of Jayne taking steps forward and back to reclaim her body as her own, in all senses, and it's stunningly real to watch. It's gentle and fragile and the hesitant place of recovery she lunges towards at the end is beautiful.

I don't have enough good things to say about Yolk honestly.

Mary H.K. Choi's Yolk is a beautiful and moving read of self-discovery filled with realistic and complex characters.

This story is told from the perspective of Jayne Baek, a fashion student in New York who is surrounded by friends and a bum of a “boyfriend” who really doesn't connect with her in any meaningful way. As she struggles with finances and an eating disorder, her estranged sister June finds her one night, pulling her into her life. June lives a very different lifestyle than her younger sister, and soon they are living and working together to save June’s life after she’s diagnosed with cancer.

THIS BOOK. I honestly don’t even know where to start. I knew Yolk was going to be a tough one to get through, and it was, but it was so worthwhile. Even though the story is still fresh in my mind, and the experience of reading it was so lovely, I wish I could read it again for the first time. It was raw and so freaking real and painful. Deeply rooted issues of shame and perfection have not, in my opinion, been explored in the way Choi does in her work, and she manages to make these topics “characters” in and of themselves. Shame is a looming entity in the novel that takes a different form for every person, and it not only surrounds food but also perceptions of identity and culture.

Choi does a beautiful job of representing her Korean American characters, and it is very apparent that she’s writing in part for that community to be really seen on-page. Choi makes a point in Yolk about how Asian people are often seen as a monolith, and how it's easy for the sisters to walk around together and be misidentified because people don’t pay attention to the nuisances in their faces. To say the least, this is extremely messed up, but it’s also really honest. That is one of the many reasons I love Choi’s writing: it’s messy, palpable, and complex. There are people out there who are like each of her characters, and I love them so much for it.

I think Choi is most successful in her manifestation of ambiance. Her stories, including Yolk, feature a strong sense of what places could be and mean for different people. New York and Texas are characters that collide in this novel and are so fantastic in the way they do. I love how New York is portrayed as this grimy, chaotic, lively place that just sucks you in; it’s so vast and crowded at the same time, but Texas is vast in such a different way. It feels close to home because of the small-town vibes that emanate from everything that Jayne and June do, contrasting with their big-city lives in New York. Food is also a character in Choi’s novels, and I really appreciate how indulgent she can be in describing a made-up concoction. However, in Yolk, it takes on a very different persona. Like shame, it looms above everything; food is almost addictive because of how it can sometimes feel like a chore to consume, how it will never be fulfilling, but you can’t physically stop eating. The idea of being able to “reset” by throwing up was so heart-wrenching to witness.

There are themes of sisterhood, resentment, betrayal, seuxuality, self-loathing, consent, life and death, and much more in Yolk. There’s something dysfunctional about how Jayne and June interact, and I love it so very much. It makes me yearn for something so varied and strong like what they have. Their relationship with their parents is another element that was so real because of the disconnected, unknowingness of it all. People are obnoxious and spiteful and hilarious and all messed-up in ways we all can’t confront. I want people to read this novel for themselves because it’s truly a masterpiece among many others from Choi.

I always love a new Mary H.K. Choi, and this one about sisters was excellent. I have such a special relationship with my own sister that i love reading books about other sisters to see how they work. I don't even personally understand the bond myself, so I'm fascinated to see it explained by others.

Yolk is a really special book. It's smart, unique, and all-consuming. Choi is a talented writer and the plot is unexpected and fresh. I found the relationship between the sisters particularly moving and enthralling and thought the eating disorder narrative was handled well and responsibly, though I do see how it could still be triggering for some readers. I definitely recommend this book!

From Lala’s Book Reviews

TW/CW: eating disorders (anorexia) and cancer

A couple of months ago, I had read the synopsis for Yolk and had added it to my TBR not only because it’s a book written by Mary but because of the representation of Asian American MCs and Jayne having uterine cancer (I’m currently in a Family Centered Health nursing class, so I’m familiar with the female reproductive tract type disorders).

Jayne, her sister June, and their parents move to Texas from Korea when they were 3 and 6 (respectively) I believe. The sisters grew up in a household that followed the Korean culture and have parts of it engrained into their being.

I’d say that Jayne (the main character of this story) is roughly 20, and she’s in love with the life that New York has to offer from the expense life style to all of the glitz and glam. Except she’s a college student who’s barely making it by and lives in a small apartment that she can barely afford the rent even though it’s totally sketchy that she shares with her roommate/hookup every now and then Jeremy.

Jayne tried to put up the front that she has her life together when in reality, it’s nothing like that. She struggles to make any real friends because she can have a blunt personality at time, and Jane is always trying to compare herself with other women who are textbook definition of “gorgeous” and tries to make herself smaller even when she realizes the effects of not taking care of herself both mentally and physically has on her health.

Jayne is literally going through the motions of life one afternoon when she’s goes to lunch with Jeremy and Rae when she sees her sister June. Jayne is unable to avoid her sisters attention and finds herself reluctantly talking to her after a year of no real conversation. Jayne finds herself in June’s rather fancy New York apartment that is basically a hop, skip, and jump away from her own living situation.

Jayne’s world is turned upside down when her sister tells her that she could possibly have uterine cancer and is waiting for more tests to confirm the suspension. Jayne is concerned because at one time they used to get along and were friends and even though they haven’t spoken in a year and conversations now are strained, June is still Jayne’s older sister and only sibling and Jayne hates the idea of not having a future without her sister.

Over the course of the book, there are a lot of emotional moments as relationships are on the road to being mended when there’s so much impending doom in the near horizon so be ready!

See this review and more at my blog, The Scribe Owl!

Thank you to Rockstar Book Tours and NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

3/5 stars

There are two main categories that contemporary YA books often fall into: the cutesy rom-coms and heart-wrenching depressing stories. Yolk is obviously part of the later. But for some reason, it didn't quite hit the spot that it was trying to. Sure, there are a few scenes scattered throughout the book where I really felt it, but for the majority of it, there was a disconnect between myself and the story. Keep in mind that this might just be a me thing, but it just didn't work for me.

A high point in the book for me was Jayne and June's relationship. They may be sisters, but their relationship was complex and ever-fluctuating. They didn't have a good relationship or a bad relationship, but instead a mix of love and disdain and disgust that made their highs and higher and lows lower.

Mental health is a hot-button issue. Many books try to portray a realistic depiction, but few can get away with it. Though I felt a disconnect with Jayne as a character, I did feel the crushingly claustrophobic life that she has. She has no room for change or growth, and whenever things are looking up they manage to come crashing down. Her eating disorder only makes it worse.

I am more than a little upset about the ending. If you've read my reviews or blog at all, you'll know that I'm not a fan of an open ending! But not only was this ending open, it was abrupt. Jayne and her mother were in the middle of a conversation and it cut off there. I'm sure it made sense to the author, writing and rewriting it so many times, but it just didn't make sense as the reader.

All in all by no means a bad book. Three stars isn't a bad rating. But even though it had so much promise, it wasn't a standout read to me.

Yolk by Mary H.K. Choi really slaps. I had no idea what I was really getting into when I started it, but wow, I am blown away. FYI, this is a really heavy book, so be sure you are in the headspace for that going into it. I was drawn to Yolk by the bright yellow cover – actually, all of Choi’s covers are gorgeous. Also, I am such a fan of stories about sisters.

Set in New York City, Yolk is a New Adult contemporary about Jayne Baek who is a fashion merchandising student. She lives in an illegal sublet with her not-boyfriend Jeremy. Jayne spends her time at school, working, and getting drunk. Her older sister June also lives in New York City. However, Jayne and June are estranged. That is, until one day June walks back into Jayne’s life with some news.

You see, June has uterine cancer. And so, the two sisters are thrown back together with Jayne staying intermittently with June in her fancy high rise apartment. June is successful and has money. However, as Jayne learns not all is as it seems. Also, while June has cancer, Jayne is also suffering with an eating disorder.

I inhaled Yolk. I started this book on Saturday and finished it on Sunday. All 400 pages in less than two days. I’ll admit, this was a hard book to read. Jayne and June do not have a super healthy relationship. At moments both are really toxic people. Also, Jayne has such an unhealthy relationship with her roommate/hook up Jeremy who basically just uses her. And she’s got a horrible relationship with food. We get all the context though on the food issues which was helpful in navigating this story.

Oh and there’s also some definite family issues back in Texas. Still, at the end of the day, what matters is very clear. I loved that although this book is SO heavy, it ends on a hopeful note. Actually, the ending is quite beautiful and so well done. I know that I will now be back to read more by Mary H.K. Choi as the writing and characterization in Yolk was just so solid and full of depth.

From New York bestselling author Mary H. K. Choi comes Yolk, the story of two estranged sisters set to re-collide as they discover they might just need each other more than they want to admit.

Jayne’s older sister, June, is unstoppable. She has her own apartment in New York, a competitive job, and doesn’t seem to need her younger sister at all. Until she gets diagnosed with uterine cancer. Jayne herself is drifting through university, barely getting by in the big city. When June re-enters her life, Jayne is reluctant to open old wounds and return to her sister’s orbit. But family is forever—at least, it’s meant to be. Not for the faint hearted, Yolk is an emotional ride back to family, and easily Choi’s most confronting work yet.

Let’s start with our main character, Jayne. Not only struggling to make rent, complete university, and navigate a toxic roommate situation, Jayne also struggles with bulimia and body dysmorphia. She’s both mentally and physically self-destructive as she navigates how to deal with her eating disorder, alongside the pressure of being successful within her family. Jayne is raw; she’s purposely callus at times, and full of hurt. And Choi absolutely nails it when bringing her to life. Having a flawed main character is a tricky tightrope to walk, and there are definitely times when, as the reader, you want to shake her and put her on the right path, but that is also the beauty of Jayne—she feels so real.

Being more of a character-based story however comes with a cost; the pace of the novel is meandering. The story, while overflowing with emotion, does not rush from one plot point to the next. Instead, it concentrates all its effort on building its characters and exploring their relationships. Choi fully fleshes out her characters and makes them feel scarily realistic, but this does sometimes drag the reader through certain parts of the story.

Family is also a main theme explored in Yolk. As daughters of Korean immigrants, Jayne and June feel the weight of expectation from their parents, and by extension, other families from their church group. When Jayne reconnects with a childhood friend, the two reflect on how their upbringing differed from the ‘typical’ American childhood. This is another major strength of the author, who depicts her culture so well in her novels that others can experience it first-hand. Discussing family sacrifices and expectations within the novel also helps to better understand Jayne’s motivations and her shaky relationship with her parents and sister. Slowly, we begin to understand the dynamic between Jayne and June, and how crucial it is for them to find their way back to each other.  

As for Choi’s writing style, it can perfectly be described as evocative, and full of hard edges. Choi writes loneliness like no other, making it raw, physical, and all consuming. Each of her characters holds a facet of a lonely person in a big city, surrounded by people. She writes about disassociation, and connection, and messy families. She writes a version of the truth that can hurt to look at, with her characters feeling a little too familiar at times that they come across as slightly unlikable. They cut to the quick. Put simply, Choi isn’t backing down on this one, and so she shouldn’t.

Overall, this is not an easy book to read. It’s emotional and uncomfortable, something which feels purposely done as we, the audience, never truly gain our footing, much like Jayne throughout the majority of the book. But I think this is the point—real life is not about always knowing what direction to take. In Yolk, we experience the life of a character who is torn between two cultures, who is constantly uncomfortable in her own skin, and who is trying to help someone when she can hardly look after herself. It’s a book about the many steps to take before starting the path to healing. Choi’s latest work is a force to be reckoned with.

I received this young adult novel as an ARC from NetGalley. The relationship between the two very different sisters is both touching and relatable. Initially strained, as the novel opens, the sisters must find their way back to each other and face sickness and vulnerability together. I would recommend that students read this book even though it contains some tough subjects.

This book was a thoughtful and beautiful look at family dynamics and sibling relationships. Choi's writing holds your attention and interest even when the plot moves slowly. Yolk is definitely a book I'll be recommending.

Relationships between sisters can be complicated and Jayne and June are no exception. They were close in the past, but their estrangement has been going on for years with Jayne feeling inferior to her older sister and hoping June will one day actually like her. While there is a brief bit of a romance happening, the true love story is between these sisters. They’ve loved, they’ve caused pain, and they hide a lot from each other. They’re having a hard time figuring out how to be honest and relate in healthy ways. I appreciate seeing a story so focused in on sisters because there aren’t many like it. I also was happy to see that this is a YA book, but Jayne is in college. There seem to be more and more of those and it’s a good trend. College students are still on the young end of adulthood.

One other love story that was running throughout was the romance with New York City. It’s a spectacular place that Choi treats almost like another character. Jayne often feels invisible, but there are some aspects of the city that help her feel seen. The city can definitely chew folks up and spit them out, so Jayne also feels a sense of accomplishment by even just surviving there.

Given the content note regarding disordered eating, you can already assume this isn’t a comfortable story. It has many sharp edges and painful moments along the way. Jayne believes everything is random and everyone is disposable including herself. The more of herself that she hides, the more presentable and desirable she thinks she will be to others. The mother she doesn’t understand, her immigrant childhood, the restaurant she grew up in, and so much of her past is something she simply cannot be proud of or share and she keeps these things hidden. She wants to create the illusion of a totally different backstory.

Jayne’s story is not all sweetness and light, so it feels true. In moments of great joy, there can also be pain and in moments of great pain, there may be joy to be found. You won’t see a fairytale ending here, but there is a bit of hope in spite of the family turmoil and the difficult health issues.

Recommendation: I would definitely recommend this to those looking for a contemporary YA that will give them something to think about long after the story ends.

Jayne and June are two semi-estranged Korean-American sisters who moved to Texas as little kids and both ended up in New York City for college, just three years apart. June is the high-achieving sister and Jayne often feels like the mess. When June unexpectedly reaches out and tells Jayne she has uterine cancer, the two become closer, though they still clash pretty ferociously at times. To me, this felt like a book about healing, both physical and emotional, and there were times it was pretty tough to read. Jayne suffers from disordered eating, and the descriptions of her binge eating and how she physically and mentally handled those were very visceral. The word that comes to mind when I think about Choi's writing here is "quiet," though the content (cancer, disordered eating, family dysfunction, unhealthy relationships) is not really quiet at all.

Yolk is a story of family and how sometimes life makes things so messy you might struggle to keep yourself afloat. Jayne Baek wants to find herself and joining the masses at New York City gives her the anonymity she seeks to make a new identity. But being an artist in the city and establishing her own presence can be tough when there are just so many people and so many different definitions of success. When she finds out that her older sister June has cancer, she's forced to reconnect with a sibling that she's tried to distance herself from and learn how to be a family again. Reading this book was like experiencing whiplash because Jayne and June have one of the most tumultuous relationships I have ever read about. As an older sister, I was either experiencing major secondhand cringe or relating immensely to June since the story is told through Jayne's perspective.

I have honestly never experienced anything that Jayne and June go through but I still saw snippets of my life in the way they interacted with each other and the world. The rawness of the story also captures the complex conversation that I think many first-generation Asian Americans have with their immigrant family's experience. Jayne also struggles with an eating disorder and body dysmorphia throughout the novel and that's just another difficult topic this story tackles. Yolk delves so deeply into the inner workings of relationships that it gets super raw and sometimes uncomfortable, but it's the humanity of the characters that makes it relatable and 100% worth reading.

ultimate verdict: family is family no matter how messy

Mary H. K. Choi could write copy for toilet paper commercials & it would probably leave me in the middle of an existential crisis. I will read anything she writes from now until eternity because I love everything she puts on paper. Is fangirling still a thing? Because I am totally fangirling.

Here’s the thing: there’s this push to write gritty, conflicted characters who are at odds with themselves and their environment. Basically authors are being driven to present reality. And they try. Truly. Especially the adult authors writing adolescent characters. They really try hard. But they miss the mark so often. I can’t put my finger on what Choi does differently. It’s like she’s just not trying as hard. Her character development seems more effortless... more authentic... more... just more like she’s snapped these moments that convey the truth of their lives. She doesn’t try to front load every single bit of backstory. The bits and pieces fall into place as they do in real life. And they don’t always fall into place. There are gaps... just as there would be in reality. And somehow the gaps make the characters feel more complete.

As this book unfolded (& it did take a while to unfold), I kept finding layer after layer of depth. Both Jayne & June were equally despicable and way too recognizable. My sister and I also lived far away from home in the same city. We also didn’t really speak to each other for the better part of a year. She didn’t ever hide behind a harp, but she would’ve. And I, like June, gave her plenty of reason to hide. I found it so difficult to read some of their encounters because they were scarily accurate

I struggled through the bulimic episodes. My own issues with body image are too close to the surface. Watching Jayne engage in such self-destructive behaviors made me feel like I wanted to shake her and hug her simultaneously. It is so hard. It. Is. So. Hard. And the future infertility? Oh, it was just too much & somehow it was just enough. This book left me broken and bruised and somehow hopeful.

In short (except this is very long), I loved it. Truly.

One last note: this isn’t YA. Jayne is an adult. A young one, but she’s still an adult. I find it really annoying that the readership of this will be limited because of where it will be shelved. The marketers must be ok with it, but I’m not. I want everyone to know Mary HK Choi’s work. I want equity of access.