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As a part of ³Refugee Week², EXILED WRITERS INK and THE MEDICAL FOUNDATION are putting on 4 ³Book Group Evenings² at Borders Bookshop, 203 Oxford Street, London W1D 2LE. One of these evenings Monday 9 June, at 7.0 p.m. will be devoted to The Railway (Vintage, 2007), a novel set in C20 Central Asia. The author, Hamid Ismailov, will be present, along with the novel¹s English translator, Robert Chandler. There will be brief readings and above all conversation with the author. Set in Uzbekistan between 1900 and 1980, The Railway introduces to us the inhabitants of the small town of Gilas on the ancient Silk Route. Their colourful lives offer a unique and comic picture of a little-known land populated by outgoing Mullahs, incoming Bolsheviks, and a plethora of Uzbeks, Russians, Persians, Jews, Koreans, Tartars and Gypsies. Rich and exuberant, the novel chronicles the dramatic changes felt throughout Central Asia in the twentieth century. 'A work of rare beauty - a compelling book' Craig Murray. 'A scintillating novel' Shusha Guppy. Hamid Ismailov is an Uzbek journalist and writer. He was forced to flee Uzbekistan in 1992. His works are banned in Uzbekistan. He has published numerous books in Uzbek, Russian, French, German, Turkish and other languages. He is now head of the BBC Central Asia Service. Robert Chandler has received prizes in the UK and the USA for his translations of Vasily Grossman, Andrey Platonov and Hamid Ismailov