A chilling exposé of the international effort to minimize the health and environmental consequences of nuclear radiation in the wake of Chernobyl.
Drawing on a decade of archival research and on- the- ground interviews in Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus, Kate Brown unveils the full breadth of Chernobyl’s devastation, extending far beyond the “zone.” Her findings make clear the irreversible impact of man- made radioactivity on every living thing: hauntingly, they force us not only to confront the untold legacy of decades of weapons- testing and other nuclear incidents, but to consider the dispersal and long-term impact of myriad manmade toxins. Exposing the truth about the health and environmental consequences of radiation exposure, Brown points to a future for which the survival manual has yet to be written.
Author(s): Kate Brown
Edition: 1st
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Year: 2019
Language: English
Pages: 432
Tags: Nuclear, Radioactive, Chernobyl
Introduction: The Survivor’s Manual
PART I // THE ACCIDENT
Liquidators at Hospital No. 6
Evacuees
Rainmakers
Operators
Ukrainians
Physicists and Physicians
PART II // HOT SURVIVAL
Woolly Truths
Clean Hides, Dirty Water
Making Sausage of Disaster
Farms into Factories
PART III // MAN-MADE NATURE
The Swamp Dweller
The Great Chernobyl Acceleration
PART IV // POST-APOCALYPSE POLITICS
The Housekeeper
KGB Suspicions
PART V // MEDICAL MYSTERIES
Primary Evidence
Declassifying Disaster
The Superpower Self-Help Initiative
Belarusian Somnambulists
The Great Awakening
PART VI // SCIENCE ACROSS THE IRON CURTAIN
Send for the Cavalry
Marie Curie’s Fingerprint
Foreign Experts
In Search of Catastrophe
Thyroid Cancer: The Canary in the Medical Mine
The Butterfly Effect
Looking for a Lost Town
Greenpeace Red Shadow
The Quiet Ukrainian
PART VII // SURVIVAL ARTISTS
The Pietà
Bare Life
Conclusion: Berry Picking into the Future
Acknowledgments
Note on Transliteration and Translation
List of Archives and Interviews
Notes
Index
