A TELEGRAPH BOOK OF THE YEAR What if Chernobyl was just the beginning? The acclaimed
winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize returns to Chernobyl to tell the gripping story of
thirty-five days of war On 24 February 2022 the first day of Russia's full-scale invasion of
Ukraine armoured vehicles approached the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in northern Ukraine. It
was the most direct way for them to reach the capital - and an extraordinarily reckless plan
after the disaster that had taken place there three decades earlier. Russian occupation of the
plant had begun. It would last thirty-five days. Closely reported and narrated from multiple
perspectives this is the story of the Ukrainians who were held hostage and worked shifts for
weeks instead of days to spare the world a new nuclear accident. We meet Valentyn Heiko the
foreman who had also been there for the clean-up of the Chernobyl accident in 1986 and turned
sixty during the occupation plant workers who found a way to celebrate International Women's
Day despite all odds Russian officers who had no knowledge of nuclear reactors and four
stalkers who were caught in the middle and stood in for the overworked cook. Gripping and
unforgettable Chernobyl Roulette sounds the alarm about the dangers of nuclear sites in an
unprecedented time when plant workers are left to fight on their own while the world holds its
breath. In a book that reads like a thriller Serhii Plokhy tells a remarkable story about
human nature uncertainty and courage.
