In Other Words is at heart a love story: that of a writer for another language. For Jhumpa Lahiri, that love was for Italian, which captivated and capsized her during a trip to Florence after college. In 2012 she decided to move to Rome with her family, for 'a trial by fire, a sort of baptism' into a new language and world. Presented in a dual-language format, In Other Words is a book about exile, linguistic and otherwise, written with an intensity and clarity not seen since Nabokov. It is a surprising, powerful and eloquent book.