CANR
WORK TITLE: Garbage Town
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WEBSITE: https://www.ravimgupta.com/
CITY: New York
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COUNTRY: United States
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PERSONAL
Male.
EDUCATION:Graduated from Binghamton University and Yale Law School.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Entrepreneur, strategist, and podcaster. Nashville Prep Middle School, founder, 2011; Arena, cofounder, 2016; The Branch, cofounder and CEO, 2021-. Worked in multiple roles during Barack Obama’s first presidential campaign and administration.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
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Ravi Gupta is an entrepreneur, strategist, podcaster, and writer. He is a graduate of Binghamton University and Yale Law School, and he founded a network of charter schools in Tennessee and Mississippi called RePublic Schools, a medicine and wellness company called Squadra Health, and a political campaign strategy and training company called Arena. As the founder and CEO of The Branch, a nonprofit media company, Gupta has also started and produced several podcasts.
His first book, Garbage Town, is about a group of teenagers in the 1990s who happen to witness a murder in progress at the world’s largest landfill. They work to interrupt the crime, but that means they have now made enemies of a Staten Island crime family. Raj Patel, one of the teenagers, has to decide how to protect his family while still trying to uncover more about the criminal enterprise, all while trying to live a normal teenage life.
Reviewers enjoyed Gupta’s debut. A writer in Kirkus Reviews called it an “immersive teen adventure” with characters who are “charmingly specific and memorably rendered.” A reviewer in BookLife Reviews described the characters as “teens you could meet on any scalding day on Staten Island.” The reviewer particularly appreciated how their relationships are “sweet, funny, and convincing” with references to the 1990s that will “ping millennial nostalgia radars.”
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BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
BookLife Reviews, March 10, 2025, review of Garbage Town.
Kirkus Reviews, April 15, 2025, review of Garbage Town.
ONLINE
Garbage Town website, https://www.garbagetownbook.com/ (October 17, 2025).
Ravi Gupta website, https://www.ravimgupta.com/ (October 17, 2025).
Ravi Gupta
Ravi is the Founder and CEO of The Branch, a nonprofit media company launched in 2021 to combat polarization and misinformation online. Before founding The Branch, he co-founded Arena, where he helped elect dozens of candidates and built the largest campaign staffer training academy in Democratic Party history—training over 7,000 political operatives in just three years.
Gupta is also the Founder and CEO of Squadra Health, an early-stage longevity medicine and wellness company, and a Shorenstein Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School. He co-hosts Majority 54, a political podcast about engaging with people across the ideological divide, and hosts Killing Justice, a true crime podcast with Crooked Media exploring an alleged political murder in India.
Previously, he was the Founder and CEO of RePublic Schools, a network of charter schools in the South. Under his leadership, RePublic’s two flagship schools became the first and only charter schools in Tennessee to rank in the top 5% of all public schools for both growth and absolute performance. He also founded Reimagine Prep, Mississippi’s first charter school.
Earlier in his career, Gupta held multiple roles in President Obama’s first campaign and administration, including serving as an aide to David Axelrod and Susan Rice.
A native of Staten Island, he graduated from Yale Law School and Binghamton University. He has received numerous awards, including the Truman Scholarship, the Webby Award, and Binghamton’s University Medal, and has been recognized in Forbes’ “30 Under 30” and Crain’s “NYC 40 Under 40.” His debut novel, Garbage Town, was an Amazon bestseller, and he’s now writing a nonfiction book, The Invisible List, on lifelong learning and mastery, forthcoming from Penguin Random House in 2026.
RAVI GUPTA is a serial social entrepreneur dedicated to reforming civic institutions. He is the cofounder and CEO of The Branch, a media company committed to combating online polarization. At The Branch, Ravi hosts several shows, including The Lost Debate and Majority 54—two podcasts focused on bridging the political divide— and Killing Justice, a collaboration with Crooked Media investigating an alleged political murder in India.
In addition, Ravi serves as the CEO and founder of Squadra Health, a company focused on longevity and wellness. Before these ventures, he cofounded Arena, where he led efforts that helped elect dozens of candidates and launched one of the largest campaign-staffer training academies in political history. Earlier in his career, Ravi founded and served as CEO of RePublic Schools, a network of charter schools in the South, and established Reimagine Prep, Mississippi’s first charter school. He also played key roles in Obama’s first campaign and first term, serving as an assistant to Chief Strategist David Axelrod and Ambassador Susan Rice.
A native of Staten Island, Ravi graduated from Yale Law School and Binghamton University. He’s won numerous awards, including the Truman Scholarship, the Webby Award, and Binghamton’s University Medal, along with recognition in Forbes’s “30 Under 30” and Crain’s “NYC 40 Under 40.”
Gupta, Ravi GARBAGE TOWN Greenleaf Book Group Press (Teen) $27.95 3, 25 ISBN: 9798886453133
A group of teens stumbles across a criminal enterprise centered around their neighborhood dump in Gupta's debut YA novel.
Staten Island, 1998: The neighborhood of Travis is home to Fresh Kills Landfill, the main dumping ground for New York City's trash--among other things. For kids like Raj Patel, it's a spot to be avoided, a place "of luminescent rivers, dog-sized rats, and rabid turkey vultures," to say nothing of its connections to the local mafia family. Raj has enough on his plate without worrying about Fresh Kills--the high schooler runs his own lucrative business burning bootleg CDs for his classmates. He uses the money to help out his Polish American mom, who's been forced to pull double shifts as a nurse's aide at an eldercare facility ever since his Indian father split for Florida two years ago. On the night following his final day of freshman year, Raj, a new Mississippi transplant named Georgia, and Raj's friends--known throughout the neighborhood as the Victory Boys--accidentally stumble across a murder-in-progress in the middle of the landfill. They manage to disrupt the proceedings (sort of), but now they have mobsters on their tails. If they want to get out of this quagmire with their lives, Raj and his buddies will have to confront the long-ignored garbage rotting in the heart of their town. Gupta evokes the time and place with sharp details and plenty of wit, particularly regarding the dump itself. "My science teacher never tired of reminding us that the only man-made structures visible from space were the Great Wall of China and the Fresh Kills landfill," narrates Raj. "As far as we were concerned, those two were comparable--monuments to humanity's limitless potential." While the premise of a group of teens uncovering a mystery is well-trod territory, Gupta delivers on both sides of the equation: Raj and his friends--who include a pair of stoners called Deadbolt and Cheetah--are charmingly specific and memorably rendered, as is Travis's multiethnic underworld.
An immersive teen adventure as big and eclectic as a Staten Island landfill.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2025 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Gupta, Ravi: GARBAGE TOWN." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Apr. 2025. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A835106494/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=3f2c2429. Accessed 20 Sept. 2025.
Garbage Town, Greenleaf Book Group, Ravi Gupta, 27.95 (312p), 9798886453133
Genre: Fiction/General Fiction (including literary and historical)
Gupta debuts with a coming-of-age mystery thrill ride that exemplifies the subgenre that, inspired by 1980s films, has come to be called "kids on bikes," but with a decided Staten Island flair, including elements of a gritty mobster story and a focus on the infamous Fresh Kills Landfill. "On June 19, 1998, Fresh Kills gave up its secrets to me," announces narrator Rajiv Patel, Raj for short, an enterprising 14-year-old with both street and book smarts--plus a booming business selling bootleg CDs. As he strategizes ways to earn money to help his overworked single mother, Raj finds his summer upended by a chance meeting with Georgia, an intriguing new arrival from Mississippi, and by a run-in with the rival New Springville Crew, louts who love to crack bones and racist jokes. But things really spin out of control when Raj and his crew, The Victory Boys, witness an unspeakable crime out at Fresh Kills.
"So, now we have beef with gangsters?" asks Raj's pal Deadbolt. "Full-on adults?" Garbage Town abounds with sharp dialogue, striking period detail, strong pacing, and heaps of heart as Raj and company deal with cops and gangsters, parents and street toughs, plus the confusions of growing up. Gupta excels at scenes where the heroes face up to their fears. The sleuthing and adventure thrill as they strive to secure evidence, face forces much more powerful than them, and--in a sad twist--try to suss out whether a cop is on their side or on the take.
Complicating it all, of course, are the challenges of those in-between years. As they experiment with love, drugs, and identities, Gupta's characters feel like teens you could meet on any scalding summer day on Staten Island. When forced into unthinkable decisions, they make choices adolescents would actually make, and the fizzing flirtations are sweet, funny, and convincing. Period references will ping millennial nostalgia radars, but they never feel belabored. Garbage Town pulses with charm, suspense, and strong local color.
Takeaway: Vital coming-of-age thriller set on 1990s Staten Island.
Comparable Titles: Claire Jiménez's What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez, Colson Whitehead's Sag Harbor.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2025 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com
Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Garbage Town." BookLife Reviews, vol. 9, no. 10, 10 Mar. 2025. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A829850531/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=e907f311. Accessed 20 Sept. 2025.