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Boots!

Where would we be without books?

Where would we be without good news in the bird?

It's a rhetorical question, sir, but where would we need without books?

From KCRW and KCRW.com, I'm Michael Silverblatt, and welcome today to a very special show of bookworm.

I'm about to be talking to Robbie Alamedin. His new book is called The Wrong End of

the Telescope. It's published by Grove Press. In this book, a version of the author, one might even

say the author, Robbie Alamedin, they share so many

characteristics in common, asks the narrator to write this book.

This book takes place on the island of Lesbos, among the refugees who have come there fleeing most frequently Syria,

and Rabi al-Alamadine has written essays about the Syrian refugees that he's met on the island of Lesbos, and he says that it's too much for him.

He can't write the book, and he asks a doctor, a marvelous transgender doctor born in Lebanon, Mina Simpson, if she will write the book for him.

Now, fascinating, this question of substitutes is very much alive for me and for Robbie Alamedin, my guest.

We both suffered the death of magnificent cats very recently. I, my beloved cat, Tati, at 22 years old, and Robbie's wonderful cat,

who I've seen pictures of, a beautiful cat named Dollar Parton. So let me begin by saying that this book addresses themes of whether empathy

can in fact be shared between humans and we, Robbie and I are here to assert that it can be shared between a human being and a cat. I'm so sorry,

Robbie. Robbie lost his beloved cat this morning. Thank you so much, Michael. Yes, yes. I lost

possibly the dearest thing in my life this morning.

And it is tragic, and I know there are more tragedies in the world,

but it still feels overwhelming at times.

So yes, he died in my arms this morning.

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