An exhilarating, immersive journey into the Exclusion Zone of Chornobyl with the disaffected adventurers who illegally stalk its ruins.
'A voice that must be heard' - Patti Smith
For many, the 1,000-square-mile Chornobyl Exclusion Zone is a symbol of total disaster: a reminder of the day thousands
of lives were shattered, now a toxic no-man's-land. For Markiyan Kamysh, it is a place to relax.
He and dozens like him call themselves 'stalkers': wild adventurers who sneak past border patrols and police to spend
days exploring the desolate corners of abandoned villages and settlements. In Stalking the Atomic City, Kamysh, the son
of a Chornobyl disaster liquidator, invites us into this alien world.
In electric prose that captures the spectral beauty of the Zone and the reckless spirit of the stalkers, Kamysh tells of
hallucinatory days alone in the rusted ruins, of panicked brushes with police and moments of ecstatic celebration in the
wasteland. A breathless account of danger and freedom, Stalking the Atomic City is a captivating insider look at a unique
subculture.
'An existential travel guide and an experiment in gonzo psychogeography, it stirs obvious comparisons with Hunter S
Thompson… mesmerising' - Telegraph
'Blunt, bare, ecstatic... [Stalking the Atomic City] has a rare quality of revelation about it and hums with a kind of
exhaustedly beautiful intensity.' - Quietus