Thorough Accout

Read this in hardback. Was glad to see it in Audible. Good thorough account of what happened that day. My one little complaint is most of the firefighters who died were referred to as "the fireman" instead of by name. The book is brimming with names for others involved in the tragedy. The firefighters deserve to be named as well.

6 people found this helpful

Great Info About Chernobyl

Excellent book. At times, the reader can be a little monotonous but it's not often. If you want to know about the accident at Chernobyl, this book is great. I've read/listened to over 20 books about Chernobyl and there was info in this book I've never seen anywhere. It goes into great detail without being "preachy." He lets the reader decide for themselves and even gives figures without gloom and doom. Overall, it's an amazing book.

3 people found this helpful

Pre-Higinbotham Pre-Plokhii #1 Work on the Subject

I have read many, many works on Chernobyl. As of the time of writing I consider Higinbotham's, Midnight in Chernobyl and Plokhii's Chernobyl: The History of a Nuclear Disaster to be the seminal works on the subject. However, much credit must go to Read's Ablaze as it was written so soon after the disaster and in the midst of the fall of the Soviet Union. We know a lot more about the situation at Chernobyl since this book was published, but much respect is due to him starting the literary cadence of works on the subject. Also notable is the narrative voice this book unfolds through; similar to his other works it is supremely engaging.

2 people found this helpful

Somehow doesn't match the actual book.

First of all, some of the names are wrong. Particularly Boris Stolyarchuk, whose name is instead Piotr for some reason. There is a repeat of Grigori Medvedev's lies that seem to have been slapped on after the original release of the book because I've cross-referenced things with a hard copy and it lacks them in the original. This audio book seems to have been edited to match HBO's fictional drama. The pronunciations are pretty bad too, but I suppose I can't fault the narrator much there, slavic names can be very difficult. However, I am very disappointed that I sat through several hours of the same lies Medvedev spouted, refuted by eye-witness accounts, even. Such things weren't in the hard copy my friend owns. It's an entertaining story, sure, but when it comes to the details of the accident it's just a huge mess. Even repeating that Valery Perevozchenko somehow managed to see the caps on the UBS jumping prior to the explosion, which never happened, before making it to the control room before the explosion at a speed no human could ever match. My time was definitely wasted.

1 person found this helpful

Excellent

well written and well read. provides different information and perspectives than some other books on the subject.

1 person found this helpful

Excellent Portrait of Chernobyl and More

This book regarding the Chernobyl nuclear disaster differs from other books on the same subject that I have read. Like many works on Chernobyl, time is spent discussing the rise of nuclear power in the USSR, and the accident at the power plant. However, more than most projects, a good deal of time is spent on the aftermath, especially its impact on people and the Soviet system itself.

Filled with fascinating accounts and first-hand reports on what would lead to the fall of the USSR, "Ablaze" is an all-around complete work by a well-regarded author. I highly recommend.

Good listen!

This was a very informative book. The writing was very engaging and it explained complex science in a way even I could understand. The only thing that frustrated me was the narration. While the narrattor was good for every other purpose, the Russian names were a distracting miss.

Decent but that narrator though....

A few new tidbits and overall a decent focus on the people involved.

One note though. If you know certain pronunciations, the one's the narrator gets wrong might just be so annoying as to put you off the entire book. In particular, his pronunciation of "Gorbachev" changes subtly every time he says it and somehow or another he gets it wrong ever time and i think he gets it more wrong as he goes along.

He's got a very pleasant voice and good delivery but it's so very striking when you come across these kind of mangled pronunciations of things that aren't terribly obscure. Kind of ruins the whole I'm listening to an "expert" type thing.

Food for thought.

Too much filler

This book used the repeated use of full names to take up page length. Name after name and full institutional titles when the stand abbreviations would do. Also, the narrator’s attempt to pronounce all the names with accents was distracting and pointless.