Chernobyl: The Fall of Atomgrad by Matyáš Namai
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This may be the first nonfiction graphic novel I’ve read, and it was absolutely worth it.
I’ve always been interested in the Chernobyl disaster, being a Soviet-born kid of the 1980s, knowing a few kids whose parents were Chernobyl liquidators, having to do school assignments on it what seemed to be every April, and by now having read quite a few books on the subject (and yes, I also love that HBO series as well). In these books I no longer look for any new information, but rather for new angles and good explanations and good presentation. And this one was a good surprise as graphic novel format allows for a fresh and memorable look at what happened in Chernobyl and what led up to it.
A graphic novel that combines a history lesson with great technical explanations of a nuclear accident, encompassing science, politics and everyday life in a 100 pages, it’s succinct and yet quite comprehensive. It’s very effective in getting points across in just a few memorable images — a vodka bribe to the police from Pripyat looters, an analogy between an oven and RBMK reactor to describe how the safety test resulted in the explosion, the saint-like imagery of nuclear halo and holy trinity of RBMK reactor creators.
Done in blue-gray and yellow color palette (I love and deeply respect that choice), the artwork seamlessly combines stark and bleakly poignant all in a few simple strokes, and those last few pages are so lingeringly sad and yet somehow almost light, without hitting any false notes. The art style brings to mind the industrial propaganda posters, almost synonymous with the Soviet era, as well as a strange style of some Soviet melancholic cartoons that may have slightly scarred me as a young and impressionable child, and all together it just works so well for the time, the events and the mood.
Perfect art choice.
4.5 stars.
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Thanks to NetGalley and Palazzo Editions for providing me with a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.
books are life 