The Centre

A darkly comic, boundary-pushing debut following an adrift Pakistani translator in London who attends a mysterious language school which boasts complete fluency in just ten days, but at a secret, sinister cost.

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Shortlisted for the Nota Bene Prize

'Absolutely stunning . . . thrilling and unique' - Gillian Flynn
'Creepy, provocative and wildly entertaining' - Emma Stonex
'A thrillingly ambitious literary chiller' - The Guardian

Welcome to The Centre. The cost may be high, but you'll never be the same . . .

Anisa Ellahi longs to become a translator of 'great works of literature', but right now she is stuck in her London flat writing subtitles for Bollywood films.

Then she is told about the Centre, an elite, invite-only programme that guarantees complete fluency in any language in just ten days. Seduced by all that it could make possible, Anisa enrols. But the Centre's services come at a disturbing hidden cost. Still - it's worth it, right? After all, success comes at a price . . .

By turns dark, funny and surreal, The Centre by Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi takes the reader on a journey through Karachi, London and New Delhi. Throughout it interrogates the sticky politics of language, translation and appropriation and asks: what price would you be willing to pay for success?

'Fantastic . . . This Black Mirror take on the world of language opens up questions of cultural appropriation, the power of language, memory and privilege' – The Observer