Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
Back Bay Books (2006), Paperback, 336 pages
Description
In the vein of "Stiff, Nickel and Dimed, and "Fast Food Nation, GARBAGE LAND takes us behind the scenes and into the corners of our own lives, revealing the fantastic truth behind what we've taken for granted or never even thought about.- Royte's last book, "The Tapir's Morning Bath, was a "New York Times Notable Book, praised widely for Royte's keen observations and narrative skill.
User reviews
LibraryThing member haiku.tx
I buy every copy of this book I find on clearance, just so I can give it away. The hardback lives on my shelf and never leaves the house. Along with The Omnivore's Dilemma and An Inconvenient Truth, this book changed how I look at my impact on the planet. You will never see your trash can the same
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way again. While you may not find yourself sorting and weighing your garbage, as the author did to begin the journey, you may hesitate the next time you reach for the individually packaged serving size at the grocery store. Whether you believe in global warming, wonder what happens when the garbage truck drives away, or are just interested in watching one woman follow the path from question to quest, this one is a worthy read. Show Less
LibraryThing member amyfaerie
So you buy it, hoping it might be something like STIFF or NICKEL & DIMED, but it's not that well written. It could have been a phenomenal book.
LibraryThing member DonCapone
I loved this book. Totally fascinating look at garbage, and what happens to it after it leaves your garbage can. But the book is much more than that. It covers recycling, sewage, water treatment, the history of garbage in New York, composting, etc. I still think about it long after having read it.
LibraryThing member cabegley
Guaranteed to make you think about the way you consume and discard. Royte weaves her research well with her own story of examning her trash and trying to follow its journey once it leaves her curb. She ran into a lot of dead ends (visiting landfills is apparently not as easy as just driving in the
Garbage Land is well written and entertaining. It has already sparked several discussions in my house about how to handle our trash, of which there are sure to be more.
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gate), and discovered over and over that there are no simple answers for how to eliminate our trash responsibly. Also, no matter how close we come to Zero Waste, municipal trash only accounts for 2% of the waste produced--the vast, vast majority of it is produced by industry, in the process of manufacturing the goods we buy.Garbage Land is well written and entertaining. It has already sparked several discussions in my house about how to handle our trash, of which there are sure to be more.
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LibraryThing member Lake_Oswego_UCC
It's all about trash! Follow the things we've disposed of to their ultimate (often surprising) destination. This book melds science, travel, anthropology, and a strong dose of clear-headed analysis as it reminds us how our decisions about consumption and waste have a very real impact.
LibraryThing member gilb
Non-fiction books in which the author inserts him/herself into the book and adds so much detail about their lives irritates me. This book is an exploration of what happens to garbage once it leaves a house. However, the author has to explain what she has in her garbage, complete with brand names,
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and places her reactions in whatever phase of the garbage route she is describing. I don't really want to know about her life and I don't care what her reactions or comments are; I want to know what happens to garbage and if items tossed into recycling bins actually end up being recycled. This book has too much author b.s to weed through to find out. When I read books like this and see unnecessary information, I can't thinking that the author places filler into the book to extend the number of pages and justify its publication. Show Less
LibraryThing member vanedow
I have to admit that I didn't read every word of this book, just skimmed through. It was a little bit too dry and detailed for me. I am interested in environmental issues, I guess I'm not THAT interested.
This book had a really interesting concept. Royte started out weighing and analyzing her own
This book had a really interesting concept. Royte started out weighing and analyzing her own
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trash output, and ended up investigating where all our trash goes, and where is ought to go. Basically, there's a LOT of trash out there. And it doesn't get disposed of properly. This was a great investigation, but not as readable as say, The Onmivore's Dilemma. Show Less
LibraryThing member nowthatsoriginal
The author's narrative style (I think it's a style nowadays) includes persistently leaping in front of the reader to demand that we notice her and her empty tuna fish can, or compost pile or her own garbage that she itemizes and weighs before putting out for collection. The first time was mildly
It's probably meant to make an informative book more readable through the "personal" touch. I found it annoying. I applaud her for being one of the most conscientious recyclers on the entire planet, but I just don't care how many beer bottles she puts out for Willy the homeless guy or how many months a roll of paper towels lasts, or how much less her weekly garbage output is than the national average.
First we are subjected to a thorough description of the contents and weight of her own kitchen garbage and then breathlessly she describes meeting the garbage collectors (San Men), and goes to the dump, then a recycling center, and rides in a canoe and then goes in a truck, all the while fixated on one item from her own trash and where it might be at this step along the garbage trail.
The teensy bit of information about the trash crisis the world is facing right now that she squeezes in between jumping in the reader's face to be sure that she is noticed is not worth the annoyance of having to acknowledge "that's nice, good job, yes, I see you."
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interesting, but I was very tired of it before the middle of the book.It's probably meant to make an informative book more readable through the "personal" touch. I found it annoying. I applaud her for being one of the most conscientious recyclers on the entire planet, but I just don't care how many beer bottles she puts out for Willy the homeless guy or how many months a roll of paper towels lasts, or how much less her weekly garbage output is than the national average.
First we are subjected to a thorough description of the contents and weight of her own kitchen garbage and then breathlessly she describes meeting the garbage collectors (San Men), and goes to the dump, then a recycling center, and rides in a canoe and then goes in a truck, all the while fixated on one item from her own trash and where it might be at this step along the garbage trail.
The teensy bit of information about the trash crisis the world is facing right now that she squeezes in between jumping in the reader's face to be sure that she is noticed is not worth the annoyance of having to acknowledge "that's nice, good job, yes, I see you."
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LibraryThing member Darrol
Raising one's consciousness of the stuff we throw away. The efforts to recycle. The somewhat puny effect these efforts have on the total waste stream. More can be done buy not buying in the first place. But of course this is not possible often enough to solve the waste issue. Need more efforts at
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the producer level. An interesting and enlightening book. Show Less
LibraryThing member grizzly.anderson
I don't recall now if it was an interview on NPR or a review somewhere else that made me look for this book, but I enjoyed it and have recommended it to a few people.
By no means is it a scholarly study of the subject. Elizabeth Royte is a journalist who decided to see what happened to her garbage,
Not being an expert on any of the subjects, I can't vouch for her accuracy but I certainly got the feeling she did her homework, and that she wasn't presenting any preconceived ideas, or grinding a particular ax. When she discusses recycling, the picture isn't entirely rosy - a recycling center is a hub of escaped trash and roaming rats, a source of noise and pollution from lines of idling diesel trucks in the neighborhood where it is located. Composting can be wonderful done properly, and economies of scale & pre-sorting can make a huge difference. NIMBY reactions to garbage may mean more hassle, cost, and pollution for everyone. One person's trash is another's treasure.
Check it out. Maybe you'll find some topics you want to dive deeper in to. If nothing else you'll have some very different factoids to generate conversation at the next party.
By no means is it a scholarly study of the subject. Elizabeth Royte is a journalist who decided to see what happened to her garbage,
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and sets out to follow it from home to wherever its final resting place is - compost, recycling center, landfill. The end result is a reasonably entertaining, easy read that provides a well-balanced view of the issues around disposing of our garbage.Not being an expert on any of the subjects, I can't vouch for her accuracy but I certainly got the feeling she did her homework, and that she wasn't presenting any preconceived ideas, or grinding a particular ax. When she discusses recycling, the picture isn't entirely rosy - a recycling center is a hub of escaped trash and roaming rats, a source of noise and pollution from lines of idling diesel trucks in the neighborhood where it is located. Composting can be wonderful done properly, and economies of scale & pre-sorting can make a huge difference. NIMBY reactions to garbage may mean more hassle, cost, and pollution for everyone. One person's trash is another's treasure.
Check it out. Maybe you'll find some topics you want to dive deeper in to. If nothing else you'll have some very different factoids to generate conversation at the next party.
Show Less
LibraryThing member Devil_llama
The author becomes obsessed with the idea of following her garbage from her curb through the process of disposal. In addition to spending countless hours weighing and sorting her own garbage, she rides with garbage men, visits landfills and incinerators, and starts her own compost pile. The writing
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is interesting and easy to read, and the trail of the garbage begins to seem almost as much an adventure as an obsession. The author even manages to wangle a visit to Fresh Kills, the large landfill in New York City that has recently closed. Show Less
LibraryThing member carterchristian1
A kind of "This is My Life" book. Consider today's trash, just waiting to join the rest of the world's trash, trash that a short time ago was something probably new and sitting on a shelf. Nontrash becomes trash, much as we do. A valuable set of bones, brain, skin, suddenly just dust to be tossed.
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Interesting book. Possibly can add the tab "humor". Show Less
LibraryThing member satyridae
It's rare for me to finish a book and carry it straightaway to my computer to order all the books in its bibliography, but in this case, that's exactly what I did. It's one of those books that helps one to understand that everything one knows about, oh, say, recycling is completely and utterly
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wrong. All y'all should read this one, and then tell your friends about it. Meanwhile, I'm shopping for a composting toilet. Show Less
LibraryThing member 2wonderY
Nothing much new except for a brave chapter on human waste, chapter 11, In the Realm of Taboo, briefly touching on constructed wetlands and humanure.
LibraryThing member ecw0647
Elizabeth Royte decided one day to find out what happened to her garbage. The result is Garbage Land, a mesmerizing trip through the hidden, but necessary, side of the consumption society.
The waste stream has tripled since 1960, 4.3 pounds per person. In 2003, every American generated 1.31 tons of
Other installations produce electricity by burning trash (WTE, or waste-to-energy, plants.) Metal and other obvious non-flammables are pulled from the huge daily loads by large magnets and recycled. The rest is burned and toxic chemicals (remember, people throw out all sorts of hazardous stuff in the trash) are scrubbed from the smoke (most of it anyway) and the resulting ash (at least that's the plan.) The problem is that evidence is mounting that people who live close to WTE plants and landfills (because methane that leaks out often contains a variety of really awful chemicals) show much higher incidence than normal of a variety of ailments.
The numbers are staggering and ironically the costs drive policy (so what else is new.) New York can no longer afford to recycle because the cost of shipping trash off to Pennsylvania (largest importer of trash in the country) is so high they can't afford the additional manpower and vehicles to process the recylables. That means more goes into the landfills or is burned, creating an even more bizarre mixture of chemicals to form who knows what in the landfill. And even 40 mm plastic sheathing at the bottom of these things is not 100% effective.
For those of you wanting to return to the simpler days of yore, a few facts:
1. In mid-nineteenth century New York, residents simply threw their trash out the window for scavengers to ravage. Often, by spring, garbage and less savory material might be two to three feet deep on the streets. Only the wealthy could afford trash collection.
2. Horses left 500,000 pounds of manure a day on Manhattan streets, and 45,000 gallons of urine. Horses worked hard; their average life span was 2.5 years and in 1880 15,000 dead horses littered the streets. Again, wild animals were expected to make the carcasses more portable by stripping the flesh off them so they could be dumped into the bay.
3. Ocean dumping virtually destroyed the famous oyster beds, but provided the land for the World's Fair and today's airports. It wasn't until 1948 that the public opinion demanded the first city dump.
Don't forget that today is the good old days of tomorrow.
The waste stream has tripled since 1960, 4.3 pounds per person. In 2003, every American generated 1.31 tons of
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trash each year, about 2.5 times what a resident of Oslo, Norway produces. The quantities of waste that we produce each day is staggering and technological approaches to managing the waste have evolved rapidly even since the eighties. Sanitary landfills, invented during the fifties in an attempt to control leachate, the intermixing of chemicals and organic materials, and prevent it from entering the groundwater supply, have become hugely expensive to build and maintain. They contain pipes to collect the leachate and return it to the top of the landfill, believing that it stimulates the breakdown of organic materials and speeds up the creation of methane, a valuable gas that is used to produce electricity in many locations.Other installations produce electricity by burning trash (WTE, or waste-to-energy, plants.) Metal and other obvious non-flammables are pulled from the huge daily loads by large magnets and recycled. The rest is burned and toxic chemicals (remember, people throw out all sorts of hazardous stuff in the trash) are scrubbed from the smoke (most of it anyway) and the resulting ash (at least that's the plan.) The problem is that evidence is mounting that people who live close to WTE plants and landfills (because methane that leaks out often contains a variety of really awful chemicals) show much higher incidence than normal of a variety of ailments.
The numbers are staggering and ironically the costs drive policy (so what else is new.) New York can no longer afford to recycle because the cost of shipping trash off to Pennsylvania (largest importer of trash in the country) is so high they can't afford the additional manpower and vehicles to process the recylables. That means more goes into the landfills or is burned, creating an even more bizarre mixture of chemicals to form who knows what in the landfill. And even 40 mm plastic sheathing at the bottom of these things is not 100% effective.
For those of you wanting to return to the simpler days of yore, a few facts:
1. In mid-nineteenth century New York, residents simply threw their trash out the window for scavengers to ravage. Often, by spring, garbage and less savory material might be two to three feet deep on the streets. Only the wealthy could afford trash collection.
2. Horses left 500,000 pounds of manure a day on Manhattan streets, and 45,000 gallons of urine. Horses worked hard; their average life span was 2.5 years and in 1880 15,000 dead horses littered the streets. Again, wild animals were expected to make the carcasses more portable by stripping the flesh off them so they could be dumped into the bay.
3. Ocean dumping virtually destroyed the famous oyster beds, but provided the land for the World's Fair and today's airports. It wasn't until 1948 that the public opinion demanded the first city dump.
Don't forget that today is the good old days of tomorrow.
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LibraryThing member roses7184
Granted this is a little outdated in its stats in today's world, but that doesn't change the fact that this is an extremely powerful read! I am so fascinated about where our garbage goes, and how the whole ecosystem functions. Do the recyclables I send out actually get recycled? Where does the
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green waste I send out go? The further I dive into this, the more fascinated I am! Show Less
LibraryThing member reader1009
Adult nonfiction. Royte explores the various aspects of garbage--landfills, recycling (paper, metal, e-waste, plastics), composting, and sewage treatment--spilling out all the details of what it contains, where it ends up, and how it gets there. She gives you more reasons to hate plastic (which
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turns out to be not really that recyclable at all, despite manufacturers' claims otherwise) and one more reason to consider organic produce (farmers aren't allowed to use sewage-turned fertilizer on it). A recommended read for anyone that is trying to be greener. Show Less
Original publication date
2005
Physical description
336 p.; 5.75 inches
ISBN
031615461X / 9780316154611