Castaway Mountain: Love and Loss Among the Wastepickers of Mumbai

by Saumya Roy

A beautiful and searing indictment of our global failure to deal with waste, told through the life of Farzana, a ragpicker living on Deonar, the legendary garbage mountain found at the edge of Mumbai.

All of Mumbai's memories and possessions come to die at the Deonar garbage mountains at the city's outskirts. In this graveyard of castaway belongings, among the vast, teetering piles of discarded items--medical waste, rotten food, old clothes, broken glass, and twisted metal--lives a small, forgotten community of ragpickers. In this sweeping narrative, Saumya Roy follows the life of Farzana, a girl who was born in Deonar, and her community that lives off other people's waste. Infused with superstition and magical realism, we learn of growing up amid the spirits of things and people sent there to die, a love story born from moonlit nights walking atop these mountains, and finding hope and beauty in this desolate landscape. But as time passes, the community's way of life becomes more and more precarious. In 2016, the mountains caught fire, forcing Mumbai to reckon with its waste mismanagement. As officials now try to close the dumping grounds, the people of Deonar are more vulnerable than ever. A modern parable exploring the consequences of urban pollution and the global impact of overconsumption, The Mountain of Castaway Belongings delivers a moving testament to the dire necessity of environmentalism, and how love and dignity can blossom in even the darkest, most desperate places.

Genres: Nonfiction, India, Environment, Adult

300 pages, Hardcover

Published September 7, 2021

Reviews

[Robyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

CASTAWAY MOUNTAIN: LOVE AND LOSS AMOUNG THE WASTEPICKERS OF MUMBAI
Saumya Roy

I hate that I could not get interested in this book. The reviews by and large are excellent, but I am sure my copy was not the one they were reading! Mine was difficult to read, had a cast of characters so large that I would need a map and a guide to keep up. Clearly, no editor ever read the book that I read, because it was poorly written.

I am being as kind as I can be, but it wasn't even ok, it was just ........

2 stars

Happy Reading!

[Staci · Rating 2 out of 5]

Listened to this via Audible. It's an interesting topic, but I found this book to be just ok.

[Rachelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Castaway Mountain (publishing today) is an eye opening book about the people who make their living in the mountains of trash outside Mumbai, picking through the refuse to find objects that can be resold.

In many ways, this is not an easy book to read. The people live right outside this mountain, with homes made of plastic sheets and air filled with smoke and gas. They have to sort through body parts, rotten food, and sharp glass to make their living. And all that doesn’t even come close to one truly horrific even 2/3 of the way through the novel.

But while this book was heartbreaking, it also showed the love and loyalty that exist in this community. Many of the people take pride in the work they do and how they provide for their family, and just want recognition by the government for the work that they do.

Roy alternates between sharing the lives of several families of pickers and showing how the municipality is trying to solve the problems caused by the trash. It seems like an insurmountable problem, made more difficult by the lack of communication between different levels of government and agencies, but it was interesting to see the solutions proposed such as waste-to-power plants.

It was also interesting to reflect on my own role in all of this as a consumer. Though I do my best to recycle, reuse, and donate items I don’t need, my family still fills up several trash bags a week. The book reminds us how this this trash mountain was built out of people’s desires and discards.

Thank you to Astra House and Sabrina Dax PR for a copy of this book!

[K.R. Gaddy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A poetic and poignant portrayal of the wastepickers of the Deonar mountains in Mumbai. Saumya Roy’s reporting and writing will shed a light on lives and environmental issues that most people don’t (and don’t want to) think about.

[maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

In CASTAWAY MOUNTAIN, author Saumya Roy, a journal and activist, reveals a community living near Deonar’s waste mountain, found outside Mumbai, India. This book is an eye-opening story, providing a window into life conditions near and among the waste. How people try to make ends meet and survive with what they discover in the heap. Through CASTAWAY MOUNTAIN, Saumya Roy advocates for humanity, for better living conditions, and for environmental change.

Though a heavy and heartbreaking read, CASTAWAY MOUNTAIN does not only focus on the people of Deonar’s trauma and suffering; Saumya Roy also emphasizes a deep sense of community and love among the residents. Farzana is such a beautiful person. I thought of her and her family a lot even after the book ended.

This book will make you uncomfortable, in the way that it forces you to confront your privileges. At times, it was personally hard for me to keep going because of the shame and guilt feelings I had for:
-being able to enjoy privileges a lot of people can’t (and wanting more)
-being such a consumer (and wanting more)
-not being environmentally conscious-enough, and
-not actively thinking of ways to reduce trash.
This book really emphasized the importance of 'reduce, reuse & recycle.' It urged me to act now.

Overall, I’m grateful that this perspective keeps me more accountable. The fact that this is reality for the people of Deonar grounded me and helped me reflect on these feelings more.

[Susan Ballard (subakkabookstuff) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a little hesitant when first offered this book. The subtitle is 𝘓𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘓𝘰𝘴𝘴 𝘈𝘮𝘰𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘞𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘱𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘔𝘶𝘮𝘣𝘢𝘪, and I couldn’t imagine how interesting a book about picking trash could be. Yet from the first pages, I was shocked and intrigued by this community and the way of life that exists at the Deonar garbage mountain in India.

𝐂𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐰𝐚𝐲 𝐌𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧 follows Farzana, a young girl living in a community that thrives by digging through the garbage mountain, other's trash, and selling it. She and her sister pick through the garbage, looking for the most valuable pieces like glass or plastics - but sometimes finding the horrific, like body pieces and discarded babies.

As unimaginable as this life seems, Farzana knows no other way and comes of age and experiences first love on the edges of the mountain.

Written in flowing narrative nonfiction, Saumya Roy reflects the personal story of Farzana and her community. But don’t miss the larger message here of overconsumption and how it impacts our environment.


Thank you to @sabrina_dax_pr and @astrahousebooks for this gifted copy.

[Zibby Owens · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is about the garbage landfill of Mumbai that is rising to 120 feet high. They are mountains made of trash that is packed with mud. As Mumbai got wealthier, these mountains got higher, and Mumbai struggled to manage its waste. This book is about these mountains that are made of our castaway things. But it is also about the people who live there and make a life there: their homes are made of garbage and their life on the mountain, people who wear and eat what they find. This story follows mainly Farzana and her family, but there are four families the author follows over these eight or nine years.

The author writes in such vivid detail about the trash mountains. The question becomes, "why do we fill our lives with things that we eventually don't care about and throw away?" It raises many questions about how we use things, the importance of recycling, and how we consume things. It makes me think about what I put in my trash. This book reminds us to stop in our tracks and think, "Do I need this?"

To listen to my interview with the author, go to my podcast at:
https://zibbyowens.com/transcript/sau...

[Christine The Uncorked Librarian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Advanced NetGalley ARC | If you read Boo’s Behind The Beautiful Forevers, don’t miss one of the newest Indian books: Castaway Mountain.

Roy’s narrative nonfiction book about the waste-pickers in Mumbai is just as raw and well-researched. Find both love and heartbreak in this community.

I found myself wanting to read Castaway Mountain from start to finish. Would Farzana live? Would she find love?

I learned so much more about Indian politics and poverty. The metaphors are endless just like the elite's trash.

You can find The Uncorked Librarian's full review here: https://www.theuncorkedlibrarian.com/...

Thank you to NetGalley and Astra Publishing House for a free advanced copy in exchange for a fair and honest review.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

The information this book is conveying is interesting and important. The presentation of it is less compelling: efforts to narrativize fall flat as the writer relies heavily on summary after the first few chapters, robbing us of the ability to connect more fully with the people with whom she worked to write this text.

[Debbie Hagan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent! Saumya Roy spent eight years following the characters in this stunning story about the wastepickers of Mumbai. Gripped me from beginning to end.

[Alvaro Francisco Hidalgo Rodriguez · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s ok. A reminder that life is really hard for a lot of people in this world. Not nearly as good as Behind the Beautiful Forevers.

[Bill Yates · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is a great deal of rambling and repetition in the text, but I managed to finish the book. It was very informative.

[Kara · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this, but right away it starts off like a report and lacks any “story telling.” I kept falling asleep every few pages.

[Patricia Burgess · Rating 4 out of 5]

A journalist’s reporting—and storytelling—of the wastepickers of Deonar township, which is the dumping ground (mountain) for Mumbai’s waste. For 120 years the waste has been transported to the township, a mountain growing taller and wider, toxic and dangerous, internal fires, mud slides, smelly and sickening. Yet the wastepickers are drawn to the mountain to gather waste to resale or make into other goods, a meager living, on the edge of society, but a community of family, friends, and fellow workers. The author tells the true story of the struggles of extreme poverty, the lure of the garbage with the hope of finding that one treasure that might be enough to support a family, the negligence, indeed criminal irresponsibility, of the local municipalities to recognize the families, to follow court orders to take the waste elsewhere, to provide other jobs to the wastepickers. With nothing but life to lose, love and family take precedent even as sickness and devastation surround the pickers daily. A fascinating but disheartening account of one city’s struggles with a universal problem of over-consumption, vividly seen in the constant, 24/7 daily garbage truck deliveries to the mountain.

[Beverly Carmichael · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the true story of the garbage pickers in Mumbai. The poorest citizens in this country make their living picking through mountains of garbage. They sell and recycle the smallest scraps of anything usable that they find. The danger is that they are breathing harmful chemicals everyday and there is also the danger of this huge pile caving in on them. This is story of one such family and the tragedy that their lives become.

[Mary | maryreadstoomuch · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Castaway Mountain, Saumya Roy tells the story of the Deonar garbage mountains in Mumbai and the people who eke out a living picking trash there. We follow talented picker Farzana, whose skills help provide for her family. Roy also gives greater historical context for the trash mountains and the very slow moving plans to try to dismantle them.

This book is not an easy read, as Roy gives us an unflinchingly honest look at the suffering in the Deonar area. Farzana's story in particular will resonate with readers, as she tries to make a better future for herself in the hardest of conditions. I appreciated the chance to learn about this subject both through Farzana's story and the larger description of Deonar. I did a mix of audio and text for this book, and I would recommend both options.

Thank you to Astra Publishing House for providing an ARC on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Marinn]

In the spirit of full disclosure, I received an ARC from Goodreads Giveaways. Set in the waste mountains Deonar, India, “Castaway Mountain” weaves the complexities of the existence of the waste mountains for the families that rely on the them and the society that produces them. A searing tale of the injustices of oppression and its many facets as well as an intimate portrayal of one family’s challenges. While it can, at times, be difficult to follow, I found myself both captivated and mesmerized by the stories.

[Lynda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book as a Goodreads giveaway. Thank you. Castaway Mountain by Saumya Roy was an eyeopener for me. Well researched, well presented. These people have so little and yet they wake-up everyday and get on with their life. This is a poignant and solemn read. Maybe not for all readers but this is a non-fiction book and well worth the read.

[Andrea Doherty · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to put this book down. I really want to know how it ends but it just doesn't read smoothly.

[Laura (auntieyorgareads) · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75 stars

[Mary Oxendale Spensley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This non-fiction account of the garbage dumps of Mumbai, the people who scavenge in them, and the courts that try to clean them up is absolutely fascinating. This is similar to Beyond The Beautiful Forevers, but much more detailed. While the other book follows the lives of several people who scavenge in toxic dumps and ponds, this book sticks more to the "mountains" of garbage. While it includes the people who live near them and scavenge from them, it describes those individuals only as far as the toxic mountain of garbage provides them with a meagre livelihood, sickens them, endangers them from gross injuries, and how they are affected by the laws created to clean the garbage up, as well as it details the actual court cases about the attempts to clean up the garbage.

Not only do the mountains of garbage produce dangerous shards of glass, pieces of sharp metals, discarded syringes, putrid smells, they also produce toxic gasses, which the author ironically describes as "halos". These gasses are highly combustible, even within the mountains themselves. Most of Mumbai was able to ignore the dumps and the people who lived off of them, until in 2016 they combusted to the point that the smoke was choking everyone, even the citizens who lived in shiny glass towers, and had never given a thought to where their refuse went.

This books if not just informative and riveting, it contains perceptive psychological analysis as well. One garbage picker suffers a traumatic injury that leaves her maimed and crippled, and weakens her immune system. Her preventable "accident" on the mountain is so horrifying that charges are laid against the most vulnerable individual possible, and the story is in the papers and the courts, as a catalyst to further create legislation to clean up the dumps. Although the other garbage pickers rally around her at first, they eventually resent her, and even blame her for the new laws being passed that put guards on the mountain so they are hindered from their previous easy access to scavenge. It's possible too that they resent her for being able to sit at home and watch tv all day, while they exhaust themselves on the filthy garbage heaps. She seems to be kept in Purdah, not out of piety, but because she is too ill to leave home, except for occasional trips to medical appointments, wearing a burka. What the fellow garbage pickers don't know is that the Burka is hiding her badly maimed and sickened body. When she is first taken to hospital after her so called recovery, the doctors fail to examine her, or talk to her about her poor health.

A major theme arising from this book is theory versus reality. Just because a document is written, with much planning and theorizing going into the concepts at hand, it does not manifest an actual reality. The court cases around the mountains of garbage are as hazy and toxic as the mountains of garbage themselves. One set of "witnesses" refer only to the documents, hopes, plans of the municipal authorities, and the other set of witnesses refer to the actual conditions at the dumps, but those witnesses are passed over.

While there is an official committee looking into the dump's conditions, making suggestions on how to lessen the dangers the garbage causes, the committee has no chairman, because the person who briefly took on that role was so sickened by the dump itself, he quit for health reasons. The role of the chairman is to physically go to the dump to observe the issues first hand. No other committee member wanted to do that, for fear of becoming ill, so no one would take the position.

Nevertheless, Saumya Roy describes the events at court: "... the chairman of the court-appointed committee had resigned a few months before, after doctors told him the mountains' halo could worsen health issues. The committee had remained directionless ever since... The municipal lawyer interrupted, claiming the opposite: another member had headed the committee... (the judges) watched, with bemusement, as their committee died and came alive in the sparring between the two lawyers, while the mountains and their people hung in the balance."

This is a heart breaking story that is all too real and familiar. Bureaucrats too often present an entirely different reality than the one that exists on this earthly plane. This book reminds us to look beyond the theories, plans and documents, and instead look at the people who are suffering, and take concrete steps to alleviate that.

[Luis Cuesta · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received this book as a Goodreads giveaway. At 326 acres wide and 120 feet tall, Deonar’s dumping ground looms over the city of Mumbai. It is one of the world’s largest mountains of trash. Every day, throngs of hopeful workers scale its peaks and scour the waste for objects they can resell. Journalist Saumya Roy reveals their stories in her book, “Castaway Mountain”. Focusing on trash picker Hyder Ali Shaikh and his teenage daughter, Farzana, Roy details the excruciating poverty of families who make their livings in the dumping grounds, describing unexpected fires that randomly erupt and burn on the heaps for days or weeks at a time. Those who live within the “halo” of Deonar have a life expectancy of 39 and suffer respiratory ailments such as bronchitis and asthma, which often lead to tuberculosis. Other dangers include territorial disputes waged by trash gangs, bulldozers, and injuries caused by sharp pieces of metal and discarded hospital syringes. I really like how Roy succeeds in humanizing her subjects while emphasizing the role that consumer culture plays in their degradation.

[Jill Dobbe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Provocative and informative, Castaway Mountain is about a culture stuck in the throes of continuous poverty. Families living around the Deonar garbage dump outside of Mumbai made their meager living looking for items in the trash that they could sell. Despite the danger of the gangs, noxious gases emanating from the trash heaps, and sicknesses the waste-pickers had to endure, very few ever left the mountains for a better life.

A continuous theme throughout and one that gave continuous hope to the residents, were the rumors of a waste-to-energy plant that was to be built, giving meaningful jobs to many waste pickers. However, with corruption, lack of organization, and continuous delays, it might have finally come to fruition in 2020 (at least that's what Google says).

The sense of community among the residents of Deonar and what they go through each day just to survive is what makes this such a heartrending story, and the fact that it is non-fiction.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for this ARC.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tells stories of the people who make their livings finding items of value on Mumbai's Deonar trash mountain.

Trucks come every day, dumping tons of garbage with each load. The "pickers," as they're called, pore over the trash mountain, looking for anything they can sell.

The focus jumps around between many different people, and I think it took away from my ability to get emotionally invested in any of them. But Farzhana, a young woman who can't stay away from the mountain, even when she has other options, is the closest thing to a main character her. During her life on the mountain, she faces terrible hardships, but also finds a place for herself.

An interesting read, but if someone wanted a book about Mumbai, I'd recommend Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo first. Then, Castaway Mountain if they want more on the city.

[Mbhatia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very well researched non-fiction account of the waste pickers in Mumbai. The story line including science, language, and culture is extremely well-researched and detailed. I could relate to Farzana's gratitude for her husband's marriage proposal showing acceptance of her "handicap" since my mother suffered from polio as a child and later expressed being grateful to my father for having married her!

I found the spoken text somewhat distracting, as each character is quoted by the author in Hindi Urdu words (for some reason written using English alphabet) and then, in the same sentence, repeated in English. Since I speed read, I would have preferred that the desi words be written in Hindi or Urdu script and the English words be in italics.

[Noorilhuda · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was underwhelming, really. Boring write-up, next-to-no-research on a very important subject-matter. The author spends more time dishing out details of what Deonar area was like in 1800s than what it is right now. Lots of things from the lives and money-making ventures of Deonar residents is left out and I had more questions about how they live, earn a living, the trash gangs, and even the extent of Farzana's shocking injuries and recovery and how she got 2 babies! There is no picture or map here. I had to watch a documentary just to know about the Deonar place ('Mumbai's Dirty Problem: Deonar' on YT Channel: Being Indian).

Anyways, thanks to the publisher for the ARC. All the best to the author.

[Nancy Mccormick · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really expected to enjoy this book; sadly, I did not. I did enjoy the character development and felt that the author should have concentrated on that aspect. The details regarding court proceedings and delays were necessary, but page after page made this book repetitive and dull. After finishing this read, I still had no idea how money for weddings, hospital bill's, etc could have been borrowed from their neighbors, other pickers. How on earth did they have enough earnings to pay there own billl's and still have enough to lend to their neighbors? These are the poorest of the poor, in India, and it just didn't seem possible.

[Lottie · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book needs more love and attention. i think a lot of the people who peeled right off of it just had a hard time keeping track of the names so they couldn't get invested, which is a shame because it is a complex tragedy in which political yellow tape intersects with and presses down on the very real squishy people who live in this book.

you feel both sides of the aisle haunting each other as the mountain grows bigger and more combustible with each passing day, occasionally absorbing people's lives or their threadbare hopes to do more than just survive -- just like the garbage that forms its foundations.

[Ajith Kunnath · Rating 5 out of 5]

If there is an award bestowed on a global city for allowing the extremities of economic pluralism then the city of Mumbai would be one of the top contenders, if not the topper.How else would you explain this paradoxical maximum city which hosts the richest private residence on the entire planet, also houses the largest slum in the continent ? When Mumbai grew as the financial hub of India it attracted millions of internal migrants as well to this 'city of dreams'. Along with the city population, the debris it produced in its wake necessitated the need for landfills, one of which is now considered as the largest landfill township in the Asian continent. Welcome to Deonar.

Work on the landfill mountains entails - to be among the filth and putrefying discards, ingest the hydrogen sulfide, carbon monoxide, methane bubbling out of it, be at the mercy of the looming landslides and accidental fires, sift through the daily picks not worrying about the jabs from medical refuses - used syringes , glasses etc - the cuts they produce and the risks they pose, resell the picks to the middlemen for a pittance that hardly earns the worker and his/her family anything to subsist and amidst all, await the miracles life could potentially throw at them in the form of a piece of gold necklace or a wad of currency.

Many have spent decades on the mountains with some of them even born right there in the middle of all the debris. Not being able to afford the luxuries the world offers doesn't mean their spirits are dampened.They have their own ways of indulgences which sometimes comes in the form of the parties thrown out with the food fished out of the detritus. Revulsive as it may sound, this is nothing out of the ordinary for Deonar rag pickers.

Amidst the mounting environmental challenges engulfing the city, the government and legal bodies are also fighting their own battles to shut down the '120+ years and still running' Deonar facility for good.However those efforts also appear to be falling into quagmires of its own due to inextricably entangled pragmatic and legal challenges that doesn't seem to have the light at the end of the tunnel.

Tracing the roots of Deonar from its establishment in 1897 in the wake of a plague crisis that ran amok in the city then, author Saumya takes us through the vicious carousels of lives and deaths of Farzana,Yasmin, Hyder Ali, Moharram Ali and many others who try to make a (ironically) living among its sprawling garbage mountains. I cannot recommend this brilliant piece of writing enough.

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

This would have been a very interesting article that I would have read and enjoyed. But it was just too much. There was SO much of the same horrifying trash and situations that I started to become numb to it. The political side dragged on and was all over the place with the timeline. It got confusing with that timeline and all the similar names. It was difficult to follow and not much reward.