There was a huge emphasis on having women scientists, which is great, but since the whole book is from Valery's pov, it is odd some of the things he notices and mentions.

Because Anna is already dying, she and Shenkov were divorcing, so why shove her (and the children) aside like this? Imprisoned for several years, the once esteemed biochemist is snatched from this bleak and hopeless existence one morning by a former academic mentor who gives him a chance to serve out his prison term in the mysterious town known only as "City 40. Here’s the second rub: Anna has terminal cancer, and was in the process of divorcing Shenkov anyway. Wherever he was going, it wasn't standard practice for the KGB to just leave a prisoner alone with a random cab driver.It's still a Natasha Pulley book and there's a languid slice-of-life tone to everything, even when desperate things are happening on the side.

How we cause it, carry its ricochets in woven chains around our necks, punishing ourselves even as we reach for comfort.Conditions at City 40 are infinitely better than the gulag, but there’s something very wrong going on at City 40: rumors about a strange explosion six years ago, radiation charts that bear no correlation with reality, and an intentional lack of radiation equipment. Pulley has long had an issue with casting her female characters as villains, or at least roadblocks for the protagonists. There is also a love story wedged awkwardly in, along with some forced references to gender politics. Excited for the work but confused by the facility's area radiation maps containing curious and contradictory measurements, Valery sets out into the forests to set up some experiments.

I would certainly recommend this interesting and engaging book for its depiction of unusual characters struggling to survive in an unusual world.

natasha pulley has such a solid grip on my stupid mortal being i no longer know what to do with myself. I just cant like or sympathise OR feel sorry or ANYTHING for a character who took part in it I am sorry , no matter how sorry he feels for it or how much the author tries to pass it as naievity . if i look sad, it’s because this is the happiest i’ve been for years, and you did that, but you aren’t even one tenth mine and you never will be. I am really fascinated with the USSR's nuclear history (it feels so morbid to say that, but it's true) so a historical fiction book set in the region of the previous-to-Chernobyl worst nuclear disaster in USSR history sounded right up my alley.

I’ve tried to keep them as in character as possible, but I hope you will forgive me any lapses, in the name of smut. Natasha Pulley must have heard me complain about misogyny in her previous books, because it's as if she's trying to be super feminist in this one, but it totally backfired.The Half Life of Valery K is an odd book because, on finishing it, I was full of the usual Pulley-related feelings. Based on real events in a surreal Soviet city, and told with bestselling author Natasha Pulley’s inimitable style, The Half Life of Valery K is a sweeping historical adventure. For reasons which I will elaborate on in the next point, I think Anna in this one is shafted more than most. but as he digs deeper, something doesn’t add up - the radiation levels aren’t right and there are secrets taken to the grave. You’d imagine that the scientist in him would be struggling with his humanitarian side to take advantage of this situation.