will cheat a bit here. I did not read as many books as I would have liked in 2019, so I will include 2018 in this list. Since I do not have any compulsions to do a "Top-10" kind of a list, here are all the books I read and found interesting, notable, or memorable.
Nuclear energy has for the past several decades struggled for acceptance as a viable and safe source of safe power, despite evidence to the contrary. Its cause was not helped by the Three-Mile Island reactor meltdown in Pennsylvania in 1979, or the Fukushima Daiichi accident in 2011. But the accident that people most remember, and the one that was as symbolically representative of the meltdown of the Soviet Union as of the actual meltdown of reactor number 4 of the Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukrained in 1986 is captured in this highly engaging read -Midnight at Chernobyl. It is a vivid account of the events that led to the fateful night, to the immediate aftermath and frantic efforts by the crew to contain the damage, to the initial disbelief in the corridors of power, to the belated realization and rescue efforts. The author covers the nuclear physics part of it early on, in easy to understand terms. Even though the death-toll from the accident was not catastrophic, which led some to conclude that the accident itself was not, it is the aftermath of the meltdown that makes for the most absorbing reading. Much to the dismay of proponents of nuclear fuel as a safe, clean alternative to fossil fuels, this book makes it difficult to enthusiastically advocate nuclear energy.