Boring Asian Female by Canwen Xu

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Elizabeth Zhang, your stereotypical overachieving Chinese- American female student is obsessed with getting into Harvard Law School. She is a senior at Columbia university in New York, 3.9 GPA, she runs her life based on analytics and what percentile she places, and is judgemental to the core.

The unthinkable happens – Elizabeth does not get into Harvard Law. She finds out that her classmate, Laura Kim, a seemingly entitled Korean student, the model immigrant who is originally destined for a career in banking, does get a spot in Harvard Law. Elizabeth wants to get to the bottom of it and visit admissions — where she is told that those schools need something more from the students who apply, something exceptional, even for Asian students. This is where Elizabeth lands on not wanting to be a “Boring Asian Female”, needing to find a story for her next Harvard application.

The story unravels from there, as Elizabeth becomes further obsessed with trying to get into Harvard. She begins to mimic Laura, stalking her, becoming more reckless in trying to take Laura down.
I initially felt some empathy for her, having grown up in an Asian family, where prestige is paramount, and the heavy weight of expectations to achieve greatness a constant – even if expectations were self-imposed. It seems the same in Elizabeth’s case, as her single mother appears more forgiving a figure.

Without spoilers, Elizabeth’s actions spiral in horrible ways, her thinking warped by this obsession with Harvard. Everything she does relates to creating the downfall of Laura Kim, so that Elizabeth can take this coveted spot she feels she is more deserving of.

An unreliable, increasingly hateful character, at some points her reactions and thoughts were ridiculous, laughable – satirical. By the end, I could not stand Elizabeth. I think that was the point. However, I couldn’t put the book down, I had to know how it would end! Although I don’t know if I was super satisfied with the ending. Super quick read, I finished it in a few days. Great debut.
Thanks to the author, Penguin Random house and Netgalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for a review.




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