Mary Mycio

Growing up in the 1980′s I remember lots of talk about the possibility of a nuclear war between the U.S.S.R and the United States. The cold War ended in 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed and people didn’t seem to talk as much about nuclear weapons, at least for a while. The question after the cold war was what happened to the Soviet Union’s Nuclear Weapons? That question is the subject behind Mary Mycio’s Doing Bizness: A Nuclear Thriller. This book is a fictional look at what may have happened in Russia and the Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Included in Doing bizness are CIA agents, disgruntled politicians, terrorist spies, black market snicker bar dealers and much more.

The story begins in the Ukraine, who has just inherited the U.S.S.R’s nuclear weapons. The Ukraine is in a state of chaos with all the changes that are happening in 1992. They are not sure what to do with the weapons, but there are plenty of people who want to take them off of their hands. Two American military contractors want to work with the Ukraine on a system to track the weapons, an Iraqi spy wants to buy a bomb for Baghdad and a pair of Monks wants their hands on a bomb to bring on the apocalypse. Everyone is coming to the Ukraine for a piece of the action. Doing Bizness is a political thriller that could have actually happened.

I have to admit, I’m not use to reading books like this and some of what happened in the story went over my head. I’m not heavily into politics and didn’t know a lot about what was going on in the Ukraine at the time. However there was a lot to like in this book. The characters were great, I liked how each one wanted the same kind of thing which was control of the nuclear weapons, but they all had different motivations for why they wanted them. I also liked hearing about the lives of the people in the Ukraine, this had to be a hard time to live through and Mary Mycio put a lot of detail in on their struggles. Mary really did her homework and it shows, she really made the early 90′s come alive.

My favorite part of Doing Bizness was the monks who lost their church and come to the conclusion that they are supposed to get a nuclear weapon to bring on the end of the world. I remember in the eighties, some religious people telling me that they believed that the end of the world will come because of a nuclear war and they stated that it was in the bible, so I could relate to the monks thinking that way. I also felt sorry for them when they lost their church and found that despite being men of god, some people in the Ukraine did not like them.

Another thing I really enjoyed about this book was how the author managed to put humor in the book despite it being a very serious topic. I found Doing Bizness: A Nuclear Thriller to be a fascinating read and I hope it gets more attention. It’s not a thriller in the traditional sense of the term, but it’s a good book and I will be looking forward to Mary Mycio’s next book.… (mer)

Mary Mycio keeps returning to this great irony: Out of the worst man-caused disaster of the 20th century springs a stunning natural ecosystem. Mary knows Chernobyl like few others. She has spent a significant portion of her life studying the accident and its aftermath. She has spent many days tromping through the woods in the Exclusion Zone. Her writing is fluid and never bombastic. A readable, interesting book hands you the chance to understand Chernobyl, and catch a glimpse of the awesome recuperative powers of nature.… (mer)