The Exclusion Zone
Alexis von Konigslow
May 6, 2025
300 pages | ISBN 978-1-998408-16-0
She would harness fear. And this terrifying place would help her do it.
Renya, a scientist who studies how people react to fear, flees a troubled marriage to conduct research on the scientists working in the “exclusion zone” around Chernobyl. In the eerily silent forests surrounding the research station, she finds more is haunting her than the dangers of radiation exposure. As she gathers data from her colleagues and probes historical records of the Chernobyl disaster, unsettling questions rise to the surface. Who is funding her research? Why are all the scientists’ findings off? And what do those who stalk the ruins of the abandoned city nearby want? In this atmospheric tale, Alexis von Konigslow deftly weaves the struggles of women in science with the impact of politics, both past and present, on people and on the environment. Part ghost story, part literary thriller, The Exclusion Zone is a mesmerizing story that reminds us all to listen to our hearts as well as the earth.
Advance Praise
“The Exclusion Zone is a quietly terrifying novel that evokes both the horror of the recent past and the very real threat to any human future. This is a work about fear: what it is, what it does to us, how we try to hide it and can’t. And yet love is here too, and friendship, and forests, still growing, and beauty even in what is poisoned, reminding us that we have to live in the ruin of what we’ve made as best we can, for as long as we can, if only to bear witness.” – Kate Cayley, author of Householders and How You Were Born
Articles
Most Anticipated: Our 2025 Spring Fiction Preview (49th Shelf, 01/02/2025)
We're delighted to see Alexis von Kongislow's The Exclusion Zone on this fabulous list of Most Anticipated Spring Fiction from the 49th Shelf!
About the Author
Alexis von Konigslow is the author of The Capacity for Infinite Happiness. She has degrees in mathematical physics from Queen’s University and creative writing from the University of Guelph. She lives in Toronto with her family.