This article examines the effects of translingual wordplay, Russian names, and cultural allusions in Olga Grushin's novel. The Dream Life of Sukhanov. Applying Wolfgang Iser's concepts of the implied reader and the repertoire of the text, the analysis considers various interpretative possibilities which may be actualized by bilingual and monolingual readers. The article concludes that while Russian elements in the text may elicit recognition on the part of the bilingual reader, they potentially serve as a device of defamiliarization for the monolingual reader, creating a parallel between the reading process and the protagonist's disorientation in the Soviet Union during glasnost'.