Where do I even start!!
Anisa feels unfulfilled by her job, being a subtitle translator for Bollywood movies and dreams of being a translator of "great" literature. She starts a relationship with Adam, who is a polyglot. When he surprises her by learning Urdu, her mother tongue, she immediately finds it extremely suspicious - especially since he had really struggled to internalise any words she had previously tried to teach him.
As their relationship is crumbling, he reveals that he learned his many languages at "The Centre", an exclusive and very expensive language retreat that is so secretive you have to sign an NDA to be able to go there and is reference only - i won't go any further with the synopsis, but I promise there is so much more and it gets more thrilling the further you read it....
Reading "The Centre" was like going down the most forbidden rabbit hole - it's one of those books that although slow-burning, keep you on the edge thinking: what is the deal with this place?
I'd usually finish by comparing this to other books I've read that have a similar vibe, but I'm afraid that would reveal and spoil the secrets of the novel...
Definitely can see this being one of the top books of the year!

A deep, dark fascinating spiral into a mysterious language-learning centre, and how we navigate the intersections of language, culture and identity.

Trying to discuss the Centre in the novel’s title is almost impossible without revealing spoilers. But as intriguing as the Centre is, the conversations around privilege that it helped to facilitate and the protagonist’s relationships within the wider novel were by far the most gripping elements of my reading experience.

Ayesha’s invitation to a top-secret, hyper-exclusive language school leaves her with lots of questions about how exactly fluency is achieved in just ten days, but more pressing are her questions about who has the privilege to access this cultural knowledge and to what extent it is an example of appropriation and inauthenticity. Throughout the novel different perspectives on gender, class, race and ethnicity provoke questions about hierarchies and overlaps and conflicts of power, and whose experience is the most genuine, who is ‘right’ in any given situation. What should be clear is murky at times, while wilful ignorance reigns at others.

Discussions of individual desires and structures of power are grounded in a friendship that is prioritised throughout the novel, and a variety of other relationships that reflect on gendered expectations, societal pressures and power imbalances. The central friendship was my favourite aspect of the novel, because it was treated with such value, and allowed to navigate conflict and difference as well as support and shared love. There was a push against ‘settling down’ because it is expected, but also an understanding of why tradition and convention are attractive for some people.

This novel left me with lots of thoughts, but the one I keep returning to is what to do about the problem of gatekeeping and establishments entrenched in privilege. Should you try to change them from within, taking what they have to share and trying to influence them in a new direction, or do you need to strike out on a new path altogether?

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
The Centre
by Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi

A story that delves into territory that really should come with a content warning, so I am going to give a little hint that will intrigue readers that weren't put off by "Tender is the Flesh". If you don't get it, and you are squeamish, please, due diligence required.

What intrigued me about this story was the idea of an elite language school which guarantees complete fluency in 10 days. I'm a lingo, I love decoding foreign words, etymology, writing systems, so this one caught my attention, however my itch was not scratched because the method of learning in shrouded in mystery and this book went to places that I never, ever imagined.

Aside from the language acquisition, there are so many fantastic elements to this book. The characters are really well written, nuanced, three dimensional and I really felt the relationships between them. Bonds of friendship are examined and tested, parent/ child relationships too. The author has us ponder the classism within race and the racism within class, she depicts the growing intolerance for the patriarchal behaviour within cultures that were previously riddled with it.

The writing is decent and I think that this author has questions to ask and I predict she will find her voice, but for me this book felt a little over-edited. There were some pieces that felt rushed, but I feel like chunks were removed without continuity checks.

When I finished this book I needed a good 24 hours to allow my thoughts to settle. I devoured it, and couldn't put it down, had to have all my questions answered. The end came suddenly, my questions hadn't all been answered. Now, 24 hours later, I forget the questions and all I can think of is the reaction this is going to have on upcoming podcasts and reviews.

Brave, boundary pushing, great debut.

Publication date: 6th July 2023
Thanks to #netgalley and #picador for the eGalley

#bookreview #irishbookstagram #thecentre #ayeshamanazirsiddiqi

What did I just read?!?! I am still wrapping my head around this book hours after finishing it. First things first, I loved the author's writing style. She got me hooked straight into the book from the first few pages. She has a beautiful turn of phrase, that kept me reading for hours. Whilst that helped the book get under my skin, what I loved most was how thought provoking this book was, not just in terms of the plot, but also about the wider themes covered within the pages. I found myself frequently highlighting passages which really got me thinking or which resonated and reflected my experience perfectly. It's a fantastic book for getting you to debate with yourself themes of identity, race, entitlement, mysogyny/patriachy and friendship. It's clever too, there are so many layers to what is going on at The Centre. I had a whole list of theories about what was going on, but I was way off, Towards the end, I feel like it veered off course a little and Anisa started to act in ways that seemed completely out of character or a complete u turn, but looking back, I think I know why. I found the ending to be (purposefully) ambiguous and in the case of this book, I really enjoyed it as it make me think long and hard about what was going to happen next at The Centre. All in all, this is a fantastic debut. I would definitely recommend it as a book group read, if your book group has a strong stomach (!). Sign me up for the author's next book!

Thank you to Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi, her publisher and NetGalley for a chance to review an advanced copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

I was already massively intrigued by the premise of this book but in no way did i expect that to be what went on at "The Centre." I found the book fast paced and enthralling from beginning to the end and I really enjoyed the ending. The book was also enjoyably accessible in terms of language and concepts so i can see it being enjoyable for a large amount of readers. As a whole, the text has left me with many questions about the world we find ourselves living in today and how knowledge has increasingly become a commodity, especially language as the world becomes progressively globalised.
I will be recommending this book highly! Quite possibly the easiest 5 star rating/review I have given in a long time!

This book was such a pleasant surprise! I took a chance on this book because the premise sounded interesting, and was really taken in by Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi's story and writing. The characters were so real and fleshed out, Anisa was a complicated, flawed but relatable and funny main character. Her relationships with Naima, Adam and her parents reflected so many aspects a lot of people will be able to relate to, and her reflections on interactions and memories with them were really profound at times.

Siddiqi doesn't talk down to the reader, over explain, or feel the need to define and translate everything for a white English reader, which is so refreshing (particularly when our main character is a translator, frustrated with innacurate and stereotypical portrayals of her culture). This was a book by a Pakistani author, with a Pakistani character narrating her life - she didn't need to explain every food, word or custom to me - and I really loved this about the book.

I also really enjoyed the creepy cult-like setting of The Centre, and the way the narrative unfolded as Anisa got deeper into it. This idea of language learning was strange and almost sci-fi / magical realism, with elements of horror, but still managed to feel grounded in our reality. And THE TWIST - I didn't figure it out beforehand, so my jaw literally dropped.

There were times I was uncomfortable, but usually this was intentional or it was detailed sexual content - but this a personal perference rather than a flaw of the book. Sometimes Anisa's decisions really started to frustrate me, but these were usually in character and still made sense. There were also some occasions when the plot seemed to meander or slow more than necessary, or time would pass doing mundane activities which could have been cut out, but there wasn't really ever a point that I was too bored to keep reading.

Overall, I'm really glad I picked this up, will definitely recommend it to other readers I know will enjoy it, and I will be on the look out for more from Siddiqi in future.

When I read in the Author’s notes at the end of The Centre and saw that Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi was usually an author of short stories, a lot of things started to make sense. The Centre is an intriguing premise with a great story at its core, but although the book isn’t terribly long, a lot of it felt like unnecessary filler.

Anisa is working as a translator when her boyfriend recommends her to The Centre, a shadowy institution which promises complete fluency in 10 days using a specialised programme. She quickly jumps at the chance to sign up, but soon finds that the cost of language might be higher than expected. Anisa is a hard main character to get to grips with and this for me is when the story started to fall apart. I never seemed to properly empathise with her - she is selfish and makes some really questionable decisions, including one with her love interest’s Dad which I found really uncomfortable later in the narrative.

It's quite easy to see that The Centre is bad news, and I think too much is revealed in the blurb which makes the smaller part of the reveal not as hard hitting as it could have been. Some of the way the book is written also makes it a little too obvious that bad things are going on – one character is referred to in the past tense by someone well before it is known they have died. As a reader we are frustrated at Anisa as she doesn’t pick up on this or any of the other clues. I also felt when she travels to meet the family and be initiated into what is happening, the big reveal is left far too long with too much filler that it gets so frustrating.

Overall, The Centre would have been a great short story, but trying to turn this into a novel by adding what is essentially filler, was perhaps not the best choice. Thank you to NetGalley & Pan Macmillan – Picador for the chance to read the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for my free eARC in exchange for a review!

I really enjoyed this twisty literary thriller, especially as it was translation focused! I thought it was a super unique concept for a novel, and I always felt excited for my reading time when I was immersed in this one! Although I don’t know what it is with more thrillery books, but I do tend to feel a bit deflated at the end… even if I like the ending, as I did here!
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Anisa is a Pakistani freelance translator who dreams of literary translation, but is feeling somewhat adrift and unfulfilled with her work translating subtitles. Her feelings are only exacerbated by her white boyfriend’s seeming genius at picking up new languages, and when he rocks up to meet her family having learned Urdu basically overnight, Anisa forces him to share his secret.
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As well as the great atmosphere built in this novel, it makes some excellent points about double standards in terms of whiteness and language learning and racism in the publishing industry. Anisa’s boyfriend Adam is white and speaks multiple languages, inspiring awe in almost everyone he meets. But if a person of colour spoke four languages but not English? They’d only be met with disdain by white westerners for not bothering to learn English. Anisa also experiences publishing’s racism. After she successfully publishes a translation of an obscure German novel, her previously rejected Urdu translations become suddenly publishable, and now she has to grapple with becoming a cog in their PR machine, playing the role of grateful woman of colour whose work has been elevated by the oh-so-generous publishers.
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I loved the various depictions of friendship - the one that blossomed between Anisa and Shiba at the Centre, and Anisa’s longterm friendship with Naima which shifts after Naima meets someone. But I felt like her relationship with Adam was too obviously just a plot-pusher (I mean obviously, we need to move forward!), and in the end I didn’t feel like there was much resolution there.
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In general towards the end, everything got wrapped up a little quickly, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that this is a propulsive, smart, addictive read that I v much enjoyed my time with!

Raced through this debut book by Ayesha Siddiqi. Loved her writing style, the premise and the several contemporary topics covered in the book. A truly multilayered book that was an easy read.

Will definitely seek out further books by this author.

Thank you NetGalley and the Publishers, Picador, for this ARC.

This is one seriously dark book, but an incredibly clever and beautiful one at the same time. The centre that provides the book’s name is a language centre where customers can somehow assimilate an entire language within ten days, and the topic of language and meaning pervades the entire book.

It’s beautifully written, with multifaceted characters, and a twist that will make you gasp out loud.

Anisa dates a guy who introduces her to The Centre, a language learning centre which allows you to learn a language fluently within 10 days. As a translator the pull of learning more languages to aid her book translation work catapults Anisa into the mysterious world of intensive learning.

The Centre totally surprised me. I was hooked immediately and as the story unfolded there were a lot of questions that I was trying to answer all the way through. And though I had an inkling I hadn't fully guessed what was coming. I felt the characters were really fleshed out and real. The talk about food in the book constantly made me hungry!

I especially liked the friendship between Anisa and Naima, a real reflection of a strong female friendship. The reflections on Anisa herself and of multicultural womanhood added depth.

If you read Babel by R. F. Kuang and enjoyed the content about language, translation, and etymology, you will enjoy this.

This book follows Anisa, a Pakistani 30-something-year-old woman who lives in London working as a translater of Bollywood movies. Her boyfriend, Adam, who speaks multiple languages at native fluency level, tells her about The Centre, an exclusive retreat where for the low price of £20,000 you can completely learn a language in 10 days.

Anisa attends, and while the vibes are weird, she indeed achieves fluency in German and quickly gains success as a book translater. Her happiness about her achievement is short-lived and she wishes to return to The Centre, and attempt to unravel its mysteries bit by bit.

This was a very entertaining read with fantastic characters. It's very readable and hard to put down, with great narrative flow throughout. It had a lot to say about the politics of immersing oneself in other cultures, translation, sexism, colonialism, islamophobia, and more, though I do wish it had focussed a bit more on some of these.

I can't actually speak about the mystery/tention as I managed to spoil a major plot twist by checking the content warnings, so unless you have a major trigger I would suggest not looking at those. I did think it was fairly obvious and I was expecting some further intrigue which never really appeared.

The final 15% was strong, though the actual ending itself felt very abrupt. However, it does leave some ambiguities in a fantastic way!

So from a mystery/thriller point of view (not that the book is categorised as such, more the blurb suggesting it) I think it lacks something. But from a general literary perspective this is very enjoyable and I really look forward to seeing more from this author.

I loved this book! The description really intrigued me, and the actual book far exceeded my expectations. I loved Babel by R.F.Kuang which had the power of language as one of its main themes and so I was really looking forward to picking this up. Very thought provoking, leaves you with lingering questions and thoughts… i read this book very quickly and was completely engrossed in the unfolding of events.

Whoa, didn't expect this! This book was such an interesting collision of ideas. There were a lot of things I really enjoyed, and equally disliked.

The ones that I really enjoyed were: everything about the Centre, and a lot of great topical commentary on feminism and race.
What I really disliked was THE MAIN CHARACTER. Ultimately, she didn't do a great deal with her language gifts. She learned German, translated one book - done with it. Learned Russian, translated one book - done with it. Then she's just waffling. Had it ocurred to her that she could have been doing so much more? Also she is so frustratingly loaded but seems to be wildly oblivious about the privileges she has.
One more thing about the boyfriend - he can afford going to the Centre all the time and part with 20K a go, but can't afford to rent without a roommate? I hightly doubt it.
The writing style of the novel was also a little plain and pedestrian.

However, I did like the actual mystery and the resolution around the Centre, I found it very intriguing.

Let me start with that I absolutely loved this book. I enjoyed the vibes and the conversations more than the plot. I found the format a bit confusing and tiresome, I think it was too self-referential. The story was fine but not really exciting, I feel like it was secondary to the ideas, more of a vehicle to deliver the message and less of its own entity. But the ideas!
I could not shut up about this book as I was reading it, I had to stop multiple times to talk through other people about the topics that were mentioned, translation and language learning being the most obvious ones, also friendship dynamics and immigration and somewhat related, what do we own the deceased and what traditions is. I spent a lot of time thinking about what would I be willing to do for knowledge, the book made me reflect on a lot of my values. 
Also, and I know this is not what the book is about, but while I was absolutely happy to accept learning to speak a language in ten days somehow,I could not get over the idea of learning to write Japanese by listening to it. But still, I adore this book, I need a physical copy to annotate it, and so does everybody.

i really enjoyed the representation in the book and the concept of having all languages at your fingertips was something that was quite interesting and it really lived up to its standards

A gripping exploration of language, identity and extremities that arise in the pursuit of dreams. I couldn’t put this down - the prose was haunting in a way that doesn’t let you come up for air until you’re done, and the plot was … well I wouldn’t want to spoil anything. A ride to say the least. The cultural nuances were also v refreshing, I felt ✨seen✨ in a way that I don’t often experience in literature.

The ending did feel slightly rushed, the plot reached a crescendo then just stopped abruptly, without a satisfactory conclusion. All in all, though, a compelling debut.

I’d describe this book as realistic fiction. The author has done a fantastic job of creating imaginary characters and situations that depict the world and society. The characters focus on themes of growing, self-discovery and confronting personal and social problems. The language is clear, concise, and evocative, with descriptions that bring the setting and characters to life. Dialogue is natural and authentic, and the pacing is well-balanced, with enough tension and release to keep the reader engaged. The E-Book could be improved and more user-friendly, such as links to the chapters, no significant gaps between words and a cover for the book would be better. It is very document-like instead of a book. A star has been deducted because of this. This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and I would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you very much to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

3.5/5.

i really enjoyed this book! siddiqi's writing style makes you long for more and keeps you entrapped within the story. i think because it was a more simplistic style of writing, it carried you through the book. sometimes when authors are more complex with their writing style it just generates confusion for me and i didn't think this was the case with this book. the premise is what really caught my attention when requesting this novel and i have to say that it did not disappoint.

i am such a sucker for unreliable narrators - it is one of my favourite forms of narration - and it was done so well here. this book covers a LOT of themes and while i enjoyed that, i thought at certain times that there was just a little bit too much going on, which made the narrative lose focus a little.

i think this book is going to be hyped up a lot on booktok and bookstagram and i am not mad about that. this was such an enjoyable read!