You're listening to Reading Glasses, a show about book culture and literary life designed to help you read better.

I'm author and book devour, Mallory Omero.

And I'm Brea Grant, filmmaker, and e-reader.

This episode, we're ticking off another box in the 2025 Reading Glass, Glasses, Glasses Challenge, read a science

book. Plus, we solve a problem about getting a library book signed. Should you do that?

Is this something we're doing now? Okay. And we're recommending Y-A books that deal with social

justice. But first, Brea, what are you reading? I am reading the center. C-E-N-T-R-E. It came out two years ago. It's been on my list for a while. It's by Aisha

Manazir Siddiqui. It is about a translator, a Pakistani translator who lives in London, who is dating

this guy who goes away and he becomes fluent in a language he wasn't fluent in, like, 10 days.

Oh.

And she's like, and it's a mysterious place.

And he's like, I'm going to tell you about it, but I'm only allowed to tell one person in my whole life.

What?

And he does tell her about it.

And then they break up.

And then she wants to go.

And so she goes, she's a translator, right? And she's like,

well, what if I could also translate in Russian? So she goes and in 10 days through this

immersive program that seems slightly mysterious, she learns Russian completely and can speak like

a native Russian speaker. Whoa. As things go on, she's just to be like, is this weird?

What's going on? How can I do this? And that's kind of where I'm at right now is on she's just to be like is this weird what's going on how can I do this and that's

kind of where I'm at right now is that she's trying to figure out what's going on it's like literary

...