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mangocult's review against another edition
5.0
What can I even say? As described to my father, while attempting to convince him to read this, it's "boring in the best way". Boring?! Yes, but no! This moment-by-moment of the Chernobyl disaster and the ensuing hours, days, weeks, months, and years is not overly novelized or dramatized, and is stuffed to the brim with facts and figures in a remarkably digestible way.
A haunting portrait of daily life in the USSR and an account that truly made the first 24-48 hours post-reactor failure feel even somewhat close to the lifetime it must have been for those trying desperately to mitigate the disaster in its immediate aftermath.
Let the atom be a worker, not a solider!
P.S.: this is also a GREAT audiobook, which really means something coming from someone who hates audiobooks! I did a little bit of audio and a little bit of print, and I enjoyed both immensely.
A haunting portrait of daily life in the USSR and an account that truly made the first 24-48 hours post-reactor failure feel even somewhat close to the lifetime it must have been for those trying desperately to mitigate the disaster in its immediate aftermath.
Let the atom be a worker, not a solider!
P.S.: this is also a GREAT audiobook, which really means something coming from someone who hates audiobooks! I did a little bit of audio and a little bit of print, and I enjoyed both immensely.
pikusonali's review against another edition
4.0
Rating: 4.5
While I devour any kind of fiction often shamelessly, my continuous demand for high-quality non-fiction is ever present. Thankfully, I'm rarely disappointed and each year I manage to find at least one gem of a book that I truly enjoy and don't hesitate in recommending to everyone.
As the title suggests, the horrific Chernobyl disaster of 1986 is presented in a novelised form. The research behind the book is amazing and the author's spectacular reporting makes this a riveting read.
From giving a background of USSR's nuclear endeavours to highlighting the aftermath of the brutal incident, every page is brilliantly written. Highly recommended!
While I devour any kind of fiction often shamelessly, my continuous demand for high-quality non-fiction is ever present. Thankfully, I'm rarely disappointed and each year I manage to find at least one gem of a book that I truly enjoy and don't hesitate in recommending to everyone.
As the title suggests, the horrific Chernobyl disaster of 1986 is presented in a novelised form. The research behind the book is amazing and the author's spectacular reporting makes this a riveting read.
From giving a background of USSR's nuclear endeavours to highlighting the aftermath of the brutal incident, every page is brilliantly written. Highly recommended!
megansbookcorner's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
4.0
This was so informative for what happened during this horrible incident. I wish I had the book in person too for the list of characters.
godofwar's review against another edition
3.0
very science-heavy, which i appreciate, since nuclear energy has always fascinated me, even if i don't feel smart enough to understand it at times. the political approach bothers me, though. i don't like how higganbotham seems to ascribe most of the failings at chernobyl to communism and "soviet attitude" while in the same book mentioning three mile island and a coverup in the UK. there's just a lot of narration that comes across as staunchly pro-capitalist and it makes me sick! also not a fan of a person being described as having "[...] narrow siberian eyes that even in photographs seemed to glint with malice." just feels like a very... loaded statement. the technical writing is very good, though, so if that's all that interests you, it's a fine book.
aprovince55's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
informative
sad
tense
slow-paced
4.5