Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Same Kind of Different as Me



This book was given to me as a gift from one of my students--shout out to Lily! This book is about two different people, who came together to accomplish something great. Denver is a black man who grew up as a sharecropper in the 50's and 60's--and I'm talking 1950's, not 1850's. He was uneducated, and always indebted to the Man. I was really surprised that this was still going on at this time period--sharecroppers picked cotton, but had to buy clothes and food from the plantation owner, and always ended up in the hole after any transactions. Ron is a wealthy art dealer who lives in Dallas-Ft. Worth with his wife and two kids, while he's not on his ranch in another part of Texas.

Ron's wife decided that they needed to do more with their money and time than buy stuff, so they decided to volunteer every day at a homeless mission. Denver ended up at this mission after leaving Louisiana and riding a train to Texas.

Anyway, Ron and Denver become best friends, they change the lives of many homeless people, and it's really a pretty good story. The only drawback is that about halfway through, the book becomes rank with evangelism. The Billy Graham talk is really off-putting and really ruins the story telling. I get that church was a big deal for these people, but the way it was presented and hammered in made the last half of the book really tedious. It took away from the story for me.

Thanks anyway, Lily! It was a good story.

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