After her graduation she was referred to a local newspaper in Brest near the Polish border, because of her oppositional views. She later returned to Minsk and worked at the newspaper
Sel’skaja Gazeta. For many years, she collected materials for her first book,
U vojnyne ženskoe lico (1985;
War’s Unwomanly Face, 1988), which is based on interviews with hundreds of women who participated in the Second World War. This work is the first in Alexievich’s grand cycle of books, “Voices of Utopia,” where life in the Soviet Union is depicted from the perspective of the individual. The cycle includes
Černobyl’skaja molitva (1997;
Voices from Chernobyl–Chronicle of the Future, 1999);
Cinkovye mal’čiki (1990;
Zinky Boys—Soviet Voices from a Forgotten War, 1992); and
Vremja second chènd (2013;
Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets, Penguin Random House, 2016).