My Dear You
Rachel Khong
Hardcover/Ebook
ISBN: 978-0593803691
Knopf, April 2026, 240 pgs

If the blurbs from Bryan Washington and Charles Yu aren’t enough to entice you, allow me to add my considerably less famous voice to the chorus of singers admiring Rachel Khong’s collection, My Dear You. My advanced, uncorrected proof has ten stories (at least some of which previously appeared in venues such as Tin House Magazine and Guernica) showcasing a distinctive, enthralling literary voice, even when the tone shifts in some pieces.

Rachel Khong earned an English degree at Yale (and interned at McSweeney’s), then an MFA at the University of Florida. She also served as executive editor for Lucky Peach magazine. Khong published a cookbook and two novels before My Dear You. The second novel, Real Americans, spans three generations and is described by Publishers Weekly as “an impressive family drama,” but PW never mentions the elements that Chicago Review of Books discusses: both magic and science fiction. In fact, a number of SFF venues seem to have missed Real Americans. The focus of the book is the characters themselves, identity and culture shine at the heart of the story. The speculative, while important and engaging, is a means to ask questions about the nature of the ways we move through the world.

This approach is carried through most of the stories in the collection. They aren’t all speculative, but when they are, they usually use the speculative to look at the human experience. I’ll highlight a few stories here as examples.

The title story, “My Dear You,” begins in heaven just after the death of a woman who was recently married. The tone is conversational while also being fairly contemplative (with a touch of humor), which works superbly in this very short format. From the opening line, where the main character is restructuring her looks and choosing the amount of space between her eyes, the narrative gently explores different kinds of social elements, particularly race and otherness. The exploration may seem simplistic to some, but close attention is rewarded with thought-provoking moments, revealing the finer nuances of this exploration. The story is grounded in what will be relatable to many, even as the fantastic elements are used to interesting ends. As the main character adapts to her circumstances and the new “lifestyle” of her afterlife, her memory of her prior life fades. One of the central ideas here is about the relationship of memory to self, others, and, to an extent, the world. For me, in a way, perhaps this story is about the inevitability of change, though I wouldn’t necessarily go so far as to say this is the author’s intent. The final lines feel poignant and kind of strange to me, perhaps unresolved or unsettling. I think the impact of those lines will vary from person to person, creating another point of reflection for readers. It’s an interesting, well-written story, one which does a lot in a short space.

“Slow and Steady” emphasizes Khong’s ability to render the mundane as memorable and important. At a coffee shop, Sophie, now in her mid-thirties, runs into a guy she went to college with. As usual, Khong’s language is approachable, but there is magic in word order, or in where Khong chooses to focus. The common act of stirring sugar into coffee, expressed plainly, lends realism to a somewhat unlikely moment while also being infused with meaning because of what is happening in that moment. The encounter also raises issues of identity and place for Sophie, as she reflects on how she was raised and what kinds of women this guy is usually into. Khong navigates this space brilliantly, touching on complex emotions many readers will have experienced, using a few candid and uncluttered lines to do so. As they sit to do a crossword puzzle together, the reader can sense an awkward, unspoken energy of some kind, something which a trite word like “attraction” would fail to exactly describe. Sophie navigates the encounter, faced with her own awkwardness, her sense of self, and ultimately, the disconnectedness she feels with other people. The piece isn’t speculative but somehow feels speculative, perhaps the encounter itself being something like the intrusion of the fantastic; and Sophie feeling eternally alien in circumstances some might see as “normal,” importantly: regardless of how others may see her.

Khong’s voice shifts slightly in “Tapetum Lucidum.” A woman and her husband go to an animal shelter and end up getting an odd little kitten. Before long, the kitten’s behavior starts to change, as if it can see something the woman can’t. Which isn’t too unsettling, since cats have different perceptions from people anyway. When the woman takes Sophia (the kitten) to the vet for routine treatments, she is startled to find herself attracted to the vet. Soon after, she is even more startled to find the vet, quite randomly, in her home. I interpret this story as being a really cool twist on the popular understanding of Schrödinger’s cat, but here the cat reflects possibility into the world. It may be more accurate to say the cat sees the possibilities which both exist and don’t exist. Khong uses the twist to explore desire and, more precisely, to look closely at the things we still desire, the what-ifs that we pretend not to long for or wonder about. The focus is less on feeling out of place than some pieces, less on self-esteem, but those elements are still there; the underlying interrogation of identity is still there, even as the steps of the story are sharply in focus. That sense of humor, which smirks throughout some of her work, is given space to shine more clearly here.

In “The Freshening,” a near-future America has devised an answer to escalating racial tension and violence. If you can, read the story without knowing too much in advance. It’s fun to be surprised, and while I’ve read many stories that deal with addressing racial tension in some way, the idea here is different enough that it’s worth being surprised. Khong marries the everyday and the relatable with extraordinary and marvelous effect, grounding the important strokes of the story in things that feel real. This lends weight to observations and details, letting the narrative describe very human things in elegant ways. Khong asks questions and creates possibilities without pushing too hard towards specific answers. Again, many readers will see themselves reflected or even refracted in this story, in some ways showing our pain, and in others, our fallibility. More specifically to this story, perhaps, our imperfections are the things that make us so similar while also alienating us completely from each other.

In “Serene,” “you” are a pair of people looking for a sex doll. For readers who can swim in the subtext, this one is hilarious and rich with meaning right from the beginning. Every line in the first few paragraphs draws descriptions of possible dolls, but also, in revealing these details, sketches truths about our culture and, in particular, men. Even the opening line, written in Chinese, will carry implications which can be understood through context. The opening pages would work on their own as a fantastic, witty flash piece; at the end of this, the point of view switches to a first-person singular, that of the salesperson, and “you” have left. The salesperson, we learn, is being pressured to sell more dolls. We learn about the boss, Hu, and Jonathan, our protagonist’s crush. We learn that our protagonist moved from a tedious, isolating position into sales, and really doesn’t want to go back. But with Khong, the real beauty of the story is in the shimmering meaning behind and between lines, the truths revealed by Khong’s narrative choices. This story takes on a lot: capitalism, sexism, racism, cultural norms, gender roles, and more, but also one’s own part in these things, the external actions and internal collusion, those unacknowledged consequences, the obvious and the subtle, and yet even more. The story takes on a lot, but it can do so because even a single line or two, when written by Khong, can convey complex ideas. Then, just when you think you get the gist of the story, the guy responsible for the AI component of the dolls shows up, and the story transitions again, taking things in even more interesting directions.

This is a wonderful book for readers who are interested in frank explorations of personal, interpersonal, and cultural things, like sexism, race, identity, and so on. These explorations go well beyond rudimentary or trite and feel more honest than many. Khong’s humor ranges from dry and subtle to higher-energy, and she has an exquisite mastery of sentences that look simple but convey intricate meanings. Okay, enough. I’ll just say it plainly: I loved this book! Go get a copy of My Dear You, read Real Americans as well, and keep an eye out for whatever Rachel Khong does next!