A Long Way Home: A Memoir

Terrifying, sad, heartwarming, inspirational. These are words that describe the amazing story of Saroo Brierley. Saroo is an Indian born Australian businessman who was separated from his family at the age of five. Saroo was born in a small suburb of Khandwa, India called Ganesh Talai, which was an important place for him all his life including when he would initiate the long and tiresome search for his mother. A memoir of this account of his experiences was published in 2013 and called A Long Way Home. I remember hearing about this story a few years ago, when it broke on national television. It was a headline stating that a man had found his mother after 25 long years of separation. I had already known the basic frame of the story, so when I read the book it was very enjoyable getting details about what I had already known. Although this story wasn’t written by Saroo himself, ghost writer Larry Buttrose did an exceptional job at capturing the emotion and details of the journey. This story is one about the journey of a little boy who’s lost his family and doesn’t know how to get back to them. Saroo Brierley was only five years old when he had to endure the hardest challenge of his life. When Saroo’s father abandoned his family for another woman, Saroo was forced to move from the Hindi side of India to the Muslim side and met with terrible living conditions. A poverty-stricken neighborhood, with a mud house and the only form of electricity coming from a candle, Saroo’s family had to work very hard to support each other. Saroo’s mother Kamla would spend 6 days a week, gone all day collecting rocks for the village to support her family. This was hard and physical work that only a strong woman could endure. While reading this memoir, it was easy to see how strong Kamla really was, both emotionally and physically. Having to physically support the family and endure the loss of her son for 25 years, it became hard not to appreciate her efforts to keep her family strong. Although Kamla worked so hard to support Saroo and his brothers, it just wasn’t enough. Guddu, the eldest brother, went to work every day, washing dishes for many hours just to make only half a rupee. Anyhow, Saroo and his family ultimately resorted to begging for money at local markets, railways, and neighborhoods. Although this was a difficult time, there were moments that Saroo looked back on with attachment. These moments included playing with his brothers and sister. The author did a good job showing his appreciation for his older brother Guddu by adding little anecdotes about their good times. The journey took off when Saroo was going to work with Guddu. Guddu left him so he could work his shift and after that Saroo would not see his hometown of Ganesh Talai again for 25 years. It was truly amazing how he was able to find his way back to a place that he had no real memory of. Family was there for Saroo when times were tough, and it was clear that the importance of family was one of the main themes in this memoir. The author did an exceptional job at showing how much his family did to be able to support him by using many examples of his mother and brothers going out for long work days even if it meant earning enough to buy a simple loaf of bread. When reading this memoir, you can notice that Saroo constantly mentions how much he loves his family, and what they mean to him. “We all reach a point as young adults when we wonder what we should be doing with our lives—or, at the very least, which direction to point ourselves in. Beyond the means to get by, we need to think about what’s most important to us. Not surprisingly, I discovered that for me the answer was family.” As much as this memoir was about Saroo and his journey, much of this memoir was dedicated to his adoptive family. The author emphasized the importance of his adoptive parents and gave a good idea of what role they played for him following such a tragic loss of his biological family. “Mum and Dad were very affectionate, right from the start, always giving me lots of cuddles and making me feel safe, secure, loved and above all, wanted. That meant a lot for a child like myself”. When Saroo talked about his adoptive parents it was difficult not to get emotional. His stylistic choice when he wrote about his adoptive parents had a very endearing tone to it. You could tell that these people meant a lot to him. As far as the layout of the book, it was very easy to follow as it was chronologically told starting with the earliest days in his childhood, to the separation from his mother and then onward to life with his adoptive parents and finally the search for his biological mother. The way the book was set up into two parts was effective in understanding the story. The author uses the first part of the book to explain the journey from his hometown to Australia and his adjustment to his new life while the second part is solely about the search for his old home. Personally, I felt that this was a good way to have divided the memoir as it allowed me to keep track with the story and understand it better. What struck me most about this memoir was how the author was able to take a tragic experience and truly connect with the reader on an emotional level. The way the author was able to take his story and make something out of it was remarkable. When I was five years old, I was in my playroom enjoying the company of action figures and toy blocks. The author was able to make me feel guilty for having such a good life by showing the struggle of this five-year-old boy losing his family with no money, no one to talk to and no way of how to find himself home. This story was truly inspirational, one of a kind of a kind and I would recommend it to anyone who loves a great read.

This is such an emotional, touching story and, for me, a more rewarding read than any novel, because it is a true account of extraordinary events in a young man's life. Some other reviews have criticized the quality of the writing and suggested a ghost writer would have made the story more descriptive and compelling. To the contrary, the original voice of the writer, and indeed his less sophisticated writing style, gave a poignancy and authenticity that would otherwise have been lost. Saroo was able to put the reader into his shoes as a five-six year old child, finding himself lost and alone in an unfamiliar, bewildering and dangerous place. He takes the reader through his emotions and the urgent learning process that even at such a young age he realized was essential to survive starvation, homelessness and human predators.... then on through adapting to his adoption and comfortable new life as an Australian. Yes, perhaps as the story moves on the writing becomes somewhat bland at times, but it moved along quickly, so I was never tempted to put the book down. In fact it was worth reading the background building up to Saroo's emotional return as an adult to India to reunite with his long lost family. I would add that I enjoyed Saroo's vivid descriptions of life in rural and urban India, perhaps made more interesting by being first given through the eyes of a small child and later his comparisons when he returns and tries to put his memories and experiences into perspective as an adult. All in all a heartwarming and remarkable story.

Sheru was a five-year-old boy helping his family live by their wits in a small town in north central India. His father was a Muslim, and had left the family to marry a second wife. His mother was a Hindu, struggling to raise three boys and a girl. Sheru was the youngest of the three boys. He couldn’t quite pronounce his name correctly and so called himself “Saroo.” He had one significant responsibility, other than begging for food and sometimes stealing it: taking care of his little sister while his mother worked carting rocks for a construction crew. His mother would often be gone for three or four days at a time for her job. His older brothers worked, begged, and sometimes stole as well. In search of work, they would often sneak aboard trains to travel to the next town or two down the line. One day, Saroo’s oldest brother took Saroo with him. The little boy was thrilled to go along. When they arrived, his brother tells Saroo to wait at the train station until he returns. He falls asleep on a bench. When he awakens, the station is deserted, and there is no sign of his brother. A train arrives, and the little boy gets in and looks for his brother. He discovers the train car is empty, with barred windows and doors that open only from the outside. And then the train begins to move. “A Long Way Home” is Saroo Brierly’s remarkable and true story of what happened when he boarded that train. The train traveled across India to Calcutta (now called Kolkata). And the five-year-old boy found himself in one of the largest, most densely populated, and most dangerous cities in the world. With only two fragments of information about where his family lived, Saroo would live on the streets of Calcutta for six months, avoid police, child molesters, gangs preying on orphaned and abandoned children, and an always-constant hunger for food. Saroo was eventually befriended by a teenager, taken to the police station, confined to a juvenile facility (along with children like himself, young criminals, and children needing medical care), and then adopted by a couple in Tasmania, the island off the southern coast of Australia. And there he lived, with a bedroom larger than the room his family in India shared and with a real bed, until he reached adulthood and began working with his adopted father in the family business. With the advent of the internet and especially Google Earth, he begins to search for his family in India. It takes years, but the recognition of a water tower in a small town begins the journey home, a journey that ends in finding his birth family. The house they had lived in was abandoned and crumbling, but his mother lived nearby. She insisted on staying near where they had lived because she believed her youngest son would one day come home. And he did. Saroo’s story is a story of desperate and unimaginable poverty, what people do to survive, the love of two families in radically different circumstances, and the determination of a young man to find out what had happened to his brother and his family after that train began to move.

I wanted to read the book before going to see the movie "Lion". So this weekend, it's what I did. Like most people are saying ....it's just a beautiful story. No way else to describe it from start to finish. First off I want to say that the fascinating thing to me was the intelligence of this man (when he was only 5 yrs old). And his memory! Not many people could have survived on their own for weeks as a 5 yr old. But then to be able to remember all these things for all those years is incredible. Being adopted is hard enough. Even if you had the very best adoptive parents...which it sounds like he did. Relocating to a new country so many thousands of miles away is another thing. For many children it's very traumatizing to switch cultures in that way. The book is half about Saroo when he was little before and after getting lost and half about him as an adult & deciding to search for his family of origins. All that he went through is interesting - but upsetting at the same time (coming from a mother's point of view). I'm also able to relate, having been adopted myself. But my adoption story is nothing like his. I was an infant & stayed in my home country. I think for anybody that's in the adoption triangle (birth family, adoptive family & adoptee) this book is very valuable. However, for those who've really never thought about adoption at all; it's a huge eye opener. So I can't think of anybody not enjoying this story or learning something from it. It was published in 2014 - so a few years have passed. I wonder how long it took them to make the movie since that's just now coming out in 2017? Sounds like it all happened pretty fast. Sometimes people go see the movie & never get around or even want to read the book. For me, I think books are generally way better than any movie could be. However, I'll come back & update this once I've viewed the film. Just for the heck of it. People might want to know which is better or if reading the book after seeing the movie is worth it. Anyway, I'm happy for Saroo! He has really taken a long journey in his life (to date) and much more is to come. Maybe one day we'll hear more about his reunion and both families.

This book exudes love, loyalty and a deep abiding sense of destiny. See? God had a plan for Soroo"s life. No matter if his name was mis-spelt, the plan of God for his life was for good and not evil. The truly sad part was the lost older brother. An honest and humble family could also say like the Father God says of all of us when we make the journey home to the cross, "This son of mine was lost, but now is found " (Luke 15:24) . His biological mother, like Mary stayed til the end. The quiet love and genuine kindness of the adoptive parents is golden as it is self-less .

When a five-year-old child falls asleep on a train in India, his life is changed forever. As he sleeps, the train transports him away from everything he knows. The child from a rural village awakes in the capital city of India, Calcutta, with all the dangers an urban setting brings. Used to begging for food, he manages to scavenge enough to survive, choosing to sleep each night with a group of holy men, thereby insuring his safety. The boy's name is "Sheru," which is the Hindu word for "lion." My first question was answered, for I could not see a connection between an African animal and a small child from India. Over time, Sheru becomes Saroo, the name he goes by today. After surviving about two months on the streets of Calcutta, Saroo ends up in an orphanage while authorities attempt to find his family. When no one comes forward to identify Saroo, he becomes available for adoption. Within a few months, a childless couple, the Brierleys, adopt Saroo and take him to Hobart, Tasmania, Australia to live. A few years later, the couple adopts another little Indian boy, Saroo's brother, Mantash. While life in Australia is a happy time for Saroo, he never forgets his Indian family, his mother, Kamla, named after the Hindu goddess of creation, Kamala, his two older brothers, Kallu and Guddu, and his younger sister, Shekila. The father of the family has married a second wife and has abandoned his first family, thereby leaving them pitifully poor. Kamla earns a meager living carrying construction bricks on her head, but all the children scavenge food and beg for money to survive. As the years go by, Saroo wonders if his memories of his previous life are accurate or merely the imaginings of a five-year-old. Saroo has his Australian friends and his Indian friends, and he becomes aware of the internet and Google Earth, a program that allows one to get a bird's eye view of geographic locations. It is then that Saroo decides to search for the neighborhood in which he grew up. After five years of meticulous searching and against all odds, on March 31, 2011, Saroo locates the house he grew up in! He begins to plan his visit to India twenty years after he left it. Concerned he will hurt the feelings of his adoptive parents, he gently refuses their requests to accompany him, feeling this is something he must do by himself. The rest of this book deals with the incredible reunion with his Indian family, how both his families meet, and how the product of two widely diverse cultures adjusts to a contented future. The years-long search could have ended in failure many times, but I believe Destiny played a major role in reuniting Saroo with his Indian family. It also speaks to the stubbornness of an individual who refuses to give up on the dream of finding his original family, assisted by countless people who offered opinions, encouragement, and other assistance when needed. I was especially impressed by Kamla's faith that her son would return if she simply stayed where he could find her. I highly recommend this book.

Saroo’s experience was amazing because he survived to tell it. He definitely had a guardian angel looking out for him during his ordeal in Kolkata.

This was an awesome, harrowing, frightening, poignant, story of little 5 year old boy, lost in Calcutta. His instincts kept him alive, avoiding starvation, capture by nefarious men, and being beaten up by other homeless kids. His whole existence centered around searching for food. Hunger was always with him. This story makes you wonder why India doesn't try to help the millions and millions of its citizens whose lives revolve around searching for food and getting clean water. This boy finally trusted someone who brought him to a place for homeless children, and then he was moved to an orphanage The orphanage was run by a caring lady whose job was to find homes to place the orphans. Saroo's life took a complete turn in another direction when he was placed with a family in Australia. I can't wait for the movie to come out staring Dev Patel. I really hated the book to end. Saroo thrives in his new life, with the love of a mother and father. But he always wonders what happened to his mother and brothers and sister in India. He knows his mother would never stop hoping he would return home. He uses modern technology, Google Earth, on his computer to try to find his home in India, but he is relying on his 5 year old memory. This is a must read.