Canwen Xu
Bedford Square Fiction
26 May 2026
334
eBook - PDF
Contemporary Fiction
ARC via NetGalley
Elizabeth Zhang knows her place in the world. She knows she's in the tenth percentile for likeability, the seventieth percentile for attractiveness, and the ninety-ninth percentile for academics.
With a hard-working ethic instilled in her by immigrant parents, armed with impeccable grades, Elizabeth thinks she is set for Harvard Law School. Until she is rejected for being too ordinary, which she translates to mean she's just another boring Asian female. But when her classmate Laura Kim gets in, everything falls apart. Why was Laura accepted? What makes her so interesting?
At first, she follows her because she's just curious. What Laura eats for lunch. Where Laura shops. The answer for Elizabeth's failure must lie somewhere in Laura's life. But still, Elizabeth just can't see it. The only thing she sees is that Laura has taken her spot at Harvard.
A spot she knows she deserves. A spot that she'll simply have to take back.
Boring Asian Female offered a fascinate psychological character study that was part serious, part satire. From the start the reader follows Elizabeth as her behaviour and thought-patterns spiral. At times the bizarre situations felt borderline comedic, yet underneath there was an exploration of societal values, the role of peer pressure and social media and the way the world makes us constantly compare ourselves to one another. This is not the first book with an envy-stalker storyline, but whereas others I've read have focused on things more from a thriller perspective, Boring Asian Female approaches the idea from a blend of satire and evaluation that I felt worked reasonably well. There were some points that felt a bit repetitive with what had come before, but for the main the pacing was good. It was a fairly light and easy read on the surface, but it still offered plenty of food for thought. I am giving it 4 stars.
I received this book as a free eBook ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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