The Yellow Peril is a significant contribution to the study of Chinese immigrants and their descendants as depicted in American fiction. Building upon the earlier work of Limin Chu and others, William F. Wu gathers and analyzes myriad pieces of fiction, much of it short fiction of marginal literary merit but deep cultural significance, in arguing that "The Yellow Peril is the overwhelmingly dominant theme in American fiction about Chinese-Americans" between 1850 and 1940.