Summary

In Chapter 7, “The Final Resting Place of the Future,” O’Connell recounts a trip that he took to Pripyat, Ukraine, which is infamous as the location of a destructive meltdown at a nuclear power plant. This meltdown—at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant—occurred in 1986. The area around the now abandoned nuclear plant is called the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, and it is possible for tourists to hire guides to show them around parts of this area. There are supposedly parts of the Zone that are now relatively safe in terms of radiation output. O’Connell’s tour group was led by a Ukrainian man named Igor. When the group reached the area around the Zone, the first thing O’Connell noticed was the unexpected beauty of the nature there, as the vegetation in and around the Zone was unchecked and untended. Tour guides let...