Review of Julie Chan is Dead by Liann Zhang

*Julie Chan is Dead* by Liann Zhang (2025). Published by Atria Books.

If you’re new here and found this blog through the mysterious powers of the Internet, welcome! My name is Ashley, and I’m a dedicated reader and movie watcher who thought to turn this website into a little digital archive of sorts.

I was watching and reading so much that I wanted to keep track of it all, so I began blogging as a way to keep these books as memories somewhat forever.

That said, I recently fell into a period of unemployment, and this blog was a solace for me. Not only was it a way to make a little bit of money when there was nothing else coming my way really, but I found, after getting my finances in order, that I enjoyed sitting down to write blog posts when I had nothing else to do in my day.

I’ve been dubbing this period as funemployment while I look for a job, but the job market isn’t looking too great right now. Regardless, I spend a lot of time in my local library, and because I am such a big fan of simple living, I enjoy the little moments where I can find a book for free here or there, while also supporting such a critical aspect of my community.

While I do love a good book from the library, being funemployed has led to another new discovery: I can finally catch up on all of the advance copies I receive! In the past I found myself inundated with advance copies, which led me to realize I need to be a bit more picky and choosy about what kinds of ARCs I was inviting into my life.

I decided to tackle my list of advance copies during this period, and I managed to get through a good portion of them! I tend to blog about most of the books I receive, if not all (I can’t recall any that I haven’t reviewed lately, but that could be my memory failing me here), as I want to put out what I thought about these books before I forget I even read them (hence why I started this blog to begin with).

This book actually isn’t an advance copy I requested on NetGalley. The publisher actually sent me a targeted email (probably because of my reading preferences in general) through the platform, and I thought the premise was intriguing enough for me to want to pick up the book.

So I started it while on a flight to California, then found myself finishing the book on the way back home, as that was another five hour flight back to the East Coast. And man was this book quite the rollercoaster. It reminded me a lot of Mona Awad’s Bunny and of Yellowface, but with a bit more unexpected twists.

Let’s get into the review! I don’t want to ramble too much, as I know introductions can get quite long.

After finding her estranged twin sister dead on the floor, Julie Chan decides to steal her life and everyone in it.

For Julie Chan, nothing seems to be working out. When she was younger, her parents died in a car accident, and her sister Chloe was adopted by a wealthy white family while Julie was taken in by her greedy aunt. Now Julie spends her days trying to get her coin at a grocery store while her sister is a famous influencer, and she’s not completely jealous at all that Chloe makes good money basically doing nothing.

It doesn’t seem like Chloe wants anything to do with her, either, as she bought Julie a house for a video sponsorship and then never appeared in front of her ever again. But one day, when Julie is expecting her day to be as monotonous as ever, she gets a frantic call from Chloe where she apologizes and then suddenly is cut off.

Afraid for her sister, Julie decides to empty her bank account by buying a bus ticket to New York City to check on her. It’s at Chloe’s fancy high end apartment that Julie finds her twin dead on the floor, and it seems like she’s been dead for days at this point.

Instead of doing something normal and reporting what actually happened though, Julie brews up a nefarious plan. She claims to be her sister and takes over her life, doesn’t have an autopsy done, and despite Chloe’s closest people being confused at the sudden personality change, Julie successfully blends in as her twin sister.

And at first everything seems dandy. The first sign of things cracking is when Julie’s aunt begins blackmailing her for money, as she realizes that the Chloe she sees on screen isn’t actually Chloe, it’s Julie. Julie begins picking up a bunch of sponsorships in order to pay the bills and blackmail, and ultimately gets sucked into the world of influencing and what it has to offer.

The second half of the book marks a major tonal shift that I thought was a whiplash. Let’s just say the second half of the book takes place on a remote Caribbean island where the influencer girl group that Chloe was a part of goes to every year. They have a new recruit, but this group of girls isn’t exactly what they appear to be on the surface either, and some major conflict is brewing between some of the characters.

The writing style in this book is fairly accessible throughout I would say—I flew through the book, and I finished it in about an hour and a half total. I thought that the prose was straightforward and simple, and it told the story quite effectively. My problems lie more with the structure of the novel and the tone shifts.

Overall Thoughts

I thought that this was a fun book. It definitely was not what I was expecting from the synopsis, especially when we got into the second half. That’s where my comparison to Mona Awad’s Bunny comes in, and, to be quite frank, I did not like Bunny when I read it and ended up giving up the book about 175 pages in.

I liked the first half of this book, but I can’t get over the second half. It’s fun and a major twist for the plot, but it feels like it doesn’t really connect with the first half, and the book feels like two different books crammed into one because of that. I personally wish it was more consistent than this.

I do think that this was worth reading though, even though I don’t think I’ll be returning to it. I just don’t see myself wanting to reread this book any time soon, but it was a good time reading it. I’ll definitely be associating it with my California trip.

Pick it up if you’re interested! You might like it more than I did, and that’s alright. Taste is so incredibly subjective.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance copy of the book.