Behind the Beautiful Forevers

Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity

By: Katherine Boo

Narrated by: Sunil Malhotra

Length: 8 hrs and 16 mins

Publisher's summary

National Book Award Winner

New York Times best seller.

Named one of Time’s 10 best nonfiction books of the decade.

One of the 10 best books of the year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, O: The Oprah Magazine, USA Today, New York, The Miami Herald, San Francisco Chronicle, Newsday.

In this breathtaking book by Pulitzer Prize winner Katherine Boo, a bewildering age of global change and inequality is made human through the dramatic story of families striving toward a better life in Annawadi, a makeshift settlement in the shadow of luxury hotels near the Mumbai airport.

As India starts to prosper, the residents of Annawadi are electric with hope. Abdul, an enterprising teenager, sees “a fortune beyond counting” in the recyclable garbage that richer people throw away. Meanwhile Asha, a woman of formidable ambition, has identified a shadier route to the middle class. With a little luck, her beautiful daughter, Annawadi’s “most-everything girl”, might become its first female college graduate. And even the poorest children, like the young thief Kalu, feel themselves inching closer to their dreams. But then Abdul is falsely accused in a shocking tragedy; terror and global recession rock the city; and suppressed tensions over religion, caste, sex, power, and economic envy turn brutal.

With intelligence, humor, and deep insight into what connects people to one another in an era of tumultuous change, Behind the Beautiful Forevers, based on years of uncompromising reporting, carries the listener headlong into one of the 21st century’s hidden worlds - and into the hearts of families impossible to forget.

Named one of the best books of the year by The New Yorker, People, Entertainment Weekly, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, The Economist, Financial Times, Foreign Policy, The Seattle Times, The Nation, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Denver Post, Minneapolis Star Tribune, The Week, Kansas City Star, Slate, and Publishers Weekly.

©2012 Katherine Boo (P)2012 Random House

Critic reviews

Winner of the PEN Nonfiction Award

Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize

Winner of the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award

Winner of the New York Public Library’s Helen Bernstein Book Award

“Inspiring...extraordinary...[Katherine Boo] shows us how people in the most desperate circumstances can find the resilience to hang on to their humanity. Just as important, she makes us care.” (People)

“A tour de force of social justice reportage and a literary masterpiece.” (Judges, PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award)

fantastic journalism, ok storytelling

I really admire the depth to which Katherine Boo was able to watch and understand life in a Mumbai slum. in my opinion this could have been a much better book if the story was presented differently. throughout much of the book, the author describes things - events as they unfold, traits of the characters and even the emotions of the characters. the book could have been better if there were more conversations between the characters, with the onus being on the reader to grasp the details.

A Masterpiece

This audiobook offers an extraordinary reading experience!

The images, characters and language of a slum in Mumbai are brilliantly captured by a journalist at the top of her game.

The actor's facility with accents and language and different voices clarified the listening experience and actually enhanced a great book.

This story offers an entirely new perspective to someone who is unfamiliar with India, or desperate, soul killing poverty for that matter. It is terribly sad on one level, but written and read with so much life and power it becomes electrifying, as compelling as a novel.

life changing

Amazing Narrative. Heartbreaking truth blends with corruption to tell a much needed story. I don't think it could be better

Incredible!!!

A beautifully written depiction of the life of the poor in a Mumbai slum. I didn't want it to end.

A Deep Look Into a Mumbai Under City and its Society.

This book does a wonderful job explains the socioeconomic world of Annawadi. Explores on its people and dives in to their stories. Wonderful read.

eight hours of non-stop heartbreak

Super sad story, enlivened by solid narration. Difficult to hear how the largest democracy on the planet also includes human tragedy almost beyond comprehension.

Reporting that reads like literature

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

You can't listen to this in all one sitting--it's pretty heavy material. I would listen to it for about an hour each day on my way to/leaving work and any more would have likely affected my mood throughout the day.

Any additional comments?

I overall really enjoyed how this story was told--it's nonfiction, but it reads very much like a novel. It's skillful, and while I worry that there might be some embellishments and liberties, it overall seems like the piece was very well-researched in the writer's 4 year's time in the slum. I just wish the author's note would have been provided at the beginning of the book to give it more context--halfway through listening, I was convinced that the book couldn't be a nonfiction book like i had initially thought when I had purchased it. After hearing the author's note about the events being truthful, the deaths and events that happened to the families that are focused on in this book hit me all at once, and it was a little much.

Reads like fiction.

I loved this book. Excellent storytelling honoring the complexity of lived experience and the entrenched reality of poverty set in a country I love. Highly recommend.

Great Book

masterful and epic story of life in slums and what poor people have to do to survive on a daily basis

Could I have known?

Should I have known? Any list of books for leadership training desperately needs this title to be included. Politicians, soldiers, police officers, and teachers must touch this dimension of humanity and then spend the rest of their careers debriefing, unpacking, and redefining how we structure society. My debt of gratitude is too deep to express.