Description
When a titanic explosion ripped through the Number Four reactor at the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant in 1986, spewing flames and chunks of burning, radioactive material into the atmosphere, one of our worst nightmares came true. As the news gradually seeped out of the USSR and the extent of the disaster was realized, it became clear how horribly wrong things had gone. Dozens died--two from the explosion and many more from radiation illness during the following months--while scores of additional victims came down with acute radiation sickness. Hundreds of thousands were evacuated from the most contaminated areas. The prognosis for Chernobyl and its environs--succinctly dubbed the Zone of Alienation--was grim. Today, 20 years after the worst nuclear power plant accident in history, intrepid journalist Mary Mycio dons dosimeter and camouflage protective gear to explore the world s most infamous radioactive wilderness. As she tours the Zone to report on the disaster s long-term effects on its human, faunal, and floral inhabitants, she meets pockets of defiant local residents who have remained behind to survive and make a life in the Zone. And she is shocked to discover that the area surrounding Chernobyl has become Europe s largest wildlife sanctuary, a flourishing--at times unearthly--wilderness teeming with large animals and a variety of birds, many of them members of rare and endangered species. Like the forests, fields, and swamps of their unexpectedly inviting habitat, both the people and the animals are all radioactive. Cesium-137 is packed in their muscles and strontium-90 in their bones. But quite astonishingly, they are also thriving. If fears of the Apocalypse and a lifeless, barren radioactive future have been constant companions of the nuclear age, Chernobyl now shows us a different view of the future. A vivid blend of reportage, popular science, and illuminating encounters that explode the myths of Chernobyl with facts that are at once beautiful and horrible, Wormwood Forest brings a remarkable land--and its people and animals--to life to tell a unique story of science, surprise and suspense.
Reviews
"Well-written and engaging."
-- Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Jauary/February 2006
"An intriguing, startling discussion."
-- The Bookwatch, December 2005
"[Mycio's] finely detailed first-person investigation of the ecology of the world's most famous disaster area has a haunting grandeur that should appeal to naturalists and fans of the apocalypse alike."
-- Discover, December 2005
"Wormwood Forest blends reportage, popular science, and encounters with the zone's few residents. The result is an account of a remarkable land, its people and animals seen through the eyes of the locals, the author, and the zoologists, botanists, and radiologists who traveled with her around the zone."
-- Nuclear Engineering International, June 15, 2006
Author Biography
Mary Mycio is a pioneering American reporter who first visited the city of Kiev in 1989 to do a semi-clandestine interview about the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl. She later became the Kiev correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and a contributor to a variety of newspapers around the world. With her background in journalism, a B.A. in biology, and a law degree from New York University, she was uniquely positioned to write the story of Chernobyl. She has accumulated reams of material about the disaster s environmental and health effects and filled numerous notebooks with details of her many journeys into the Zone of Alienation. She currently lives in Kiev where she is also director of the IREX ProMedia Legal Defense and Education Program for Ukrainian journalists.
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