Synopses & Reviews
For most of us, traveling means visiting the most beautiful places on Earth—Paris, the Taj Mahal, the Grand Canyon. Its rare to book a plane ticket to visit the lifeless moonscape of Canadas oil sand strip mines, or to seek out the Chinese city of Linfen, legendary as the most polluted in the world. But in
Visit Sunny Chernobyl, Andrew Blackwell embraces a different kind of travel, taking a jaunt through the most gruesomely polluted places on Earth.
From the hidden bars and convenience stores of a radioactive wilderness to the sacred but reeking waters of India, Visit Sunny Chernobyl fuses immersive first-person reporting with satire and analysis, making the case that its time to start appreciating our planet as it is—not as we wish it would be. Irreverent and reflective, the book is a love letter to our biospheres most tainted, most degraded ecosystems, and a measured consideration of what they mean for us.
Equal parts travelogue, expose, environmental memoir, and faux guidebook, Blackwell careens through a rogues gallery of environmental disaster areas in search of the worst the world has to offer—and approaches a deeper understanding of whats really happening to our planet in the process.
Review
"Andrew Blackwell is a wonderful tour guide to the least wonderful places on earth. His book is a riveting toxic adventure. But more than just entertaining, the book will teach you a lot about the environment and the future of our increasingly polluted world." A.J. Jacobs, New York Times bestselling author of The Year of Living Biblically
Review
"With a touch of wry wit and a reporter's keen eye, Andrew Blackwell plays tourist in the centers of environmental destruction and finds sardonic entertainment alongside tragedy. His meticulous observations will make you laugh and weep, and you will get an important education along the way." David K. Shipler, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and author of Rights at Risk: The Limits of Liberty in Modern America
Synopsis
For most of us, traveling means visiting the most beautiful places on Earth — Paris, the Taj Mahal, the Grand Canyon. Its rare to book a plane ticket to visit the lifeless moonscape of Canada's oil sand strip mines, or to seek out the Chinese city of Linfen, legendary as the most polluted in the world. But in
Visit Sunny Chernobyl, Andrew Blackwell embraces a different kind of travel, taking a jaunt through the most gruesomely polluted places on Earth.
From the hidden bars and convenience stores of a radioactive wilderness to the sacred but reeking waters of India, Visit Sunny Chernobyl fuses immersive first-person reporting with satire and analysis, making the case that its time to start appreciating our planet as it is — not as we wish it would be. Irreverent and reflective, the book is a love letter to our biospheres most tainted, most degraded ecosystems, and a measured consideration of what they mean for us.
Equal parts travelogue, expose, environmental memoir, and faux guidebook, Blackwell careens through a rogues gallery of environmental disaster areas in search of the worst the world has to offer — and approaches a deeper understanding of whats really happening to our planet in the process.
About the Author
ANDREW BLACKWELL is a journalist and filmmaker. He is a 2011 Fellow in Nonfiction Literature from the New York Foundation of the Arts. Visit Sunny Chernobyl is his first book. He lives in New York City.