Same Kind of Different As Me: A Modern-Day Slave, an International Art Dealer, and the Unlikely Woman Who Bound Them Together | 
| Authors: Ron Hall, Denver Moore
Creator: Lynn Vincent
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
List Price: $14.99
Buy New: $8.52
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Rating:  241 reviews
Sales Rank: 155
Media: Paperback
Pages: 224
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8
ISBN: 084991910X
Dewey Decimal Number: 920
EAN: 9780849919107
ASIN: 084991910X
Publication Date: March 11, 2008
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Product Description
A dangerous, homeless drifter who grew up picking cotton in virtual slavery. An upscale art dealer accustomed to the world of Armani and Chanel. A gutsy woman with a stubborn dream. A story so incredible no novelist would dare dream it. It begins outside a burning plantation hut in Louisiana . . . and an East Texas honky-tonk . . . and, without a doubt, in the heart of God. It unfolds in a Hollywood hacienda . . . an upscale New York gallery . . . a downtown dumpster . . . a Texas ranch. Gritty with pain and betrayal and brutality, this true story also shines with an unexpected, life-changing love.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 236 more reviews...
Better Than Fiction May 3, 2007
Tim Challies (Oakville, Ontario)
102 out of 108 found this review helpful
At a recent conference I met a gentleman who happens to edit one of those airline magazines that always competes with your legroom in an airplane. A short time ago he sent me an email and asked if I had heard of a book called Same Kind of Different as Me and recommended that I read it. He seemed like a good enough guy and the book had a great cover, so I went ahead and ordered it sight unseen (or nearly so). And what a book it turned out to be.
Same Kind of Different as Me, a book that is factual but could just as easily be fiction, tells the unlikely story of the unlikeliest of friends--Ron Hall and Denver Moore. Told in two voices, the book alternates between telling the story from the perspective of Ron and Denver.
Ron Hall is a wealthy international art dealer who travels the world buying and selling rare and expensive works of art. He has grown rich but has also grown selfish and has grown away from his family. When Ron Hall reluctantly volunteers at a homeless shelter (at the insistence of his wife) he soon comes into contact with Denver, a man his wife is convinced is going to change the city. Denver grew up as a sharecropper in Louisiana, living a life that seemed little different from the life of his ancestors one hundreds years before. He eventually walked away from the cotton fields and found that, while life on the streets of Fort Worth was difficult, it was easier than being a sharecropper. It was here, in a homeless shelter, that the two men met, one serving food and the other being a reluctant recipient of this charity.
Chef Jim and Deborah chatted easily while I mentally balanced the ledger between pleasing my wife and contracting a terminal disease. I had to admit that his idea seemed like an easy way to start--serve the evening meal once a week, and we'd be in and out in three, four hours max. We could minister from behind the rusty steel serving counter, safely separated from the customers. And we could enter and leave through the rear kitchen door, thereby minimizing contact with those likely to hit us up for money. The whole arrangement seemed like a good way for us to fulfill Deborah's desire to help the homeless without our touching them or letting them touch us.
Her bright laugh pulled my attention back into the room. "I think that sounds great, Jim!" she was saying. "I don't see any reason why we can't start tomorrow. In fact, let's just say you can count on us to serve every Tuesday until you hear otherwise."
"Praise the Lord!" Chef Jim said, this time giving Deborah a great big Baptist hug. It did not sound great to me, but Deborah had not asked me what I thought. She never did do much by committee.
At first unable to crack Denver's stony personality, Hall eventually prevails and strikes up a friendship with a man worlds apart. They become fast friends who endure a tragedy together and who soon grow in their love, respect and admiration of each other. Each man teaches the other about life and faith. Somehow the story of the relationship between these two men is fascinating and inspiring. It offers a glimpse into two worlds that are nearly opposite and shows what happens when these worlds come into contact with each other. I can still hardly believe this was not a novel.
While the book showcases a fun sense of humor, there is also plenty of heart.
And yet for all the courage I knew she had, she had shown this glimmer of fear. Oh, how I loved her then. Fiercely. The passion you feel down in your guts where no one else can see and only you know its frightening force. I could remember that there were times in our nearly three decades of marriage that I had loved her less than at that moment, and guilt pierced me like a spike. Though she had always given unconditionally, I had often not been willing to do so in return, She has deserved better than she's gotten from me, I thought, and nearly drowned in a wave of regret thirty years deep.
Between the heart and the humor is some good theology, but, unfortunately, also some that would require believing the word of the author rather than finding any basis in Scripture. For example, there is talk of a "visitation" where a dead person returns to earth, however briefly, to offer comfort and encouragement. This is not something the Bible tells us we can or should expect. There was also some theology that was suspicious and seemed to reveal an understanding of the gospel that was somewhat incomplete. I found these distracting and disappointing, but not fatal to the book.
So while Same Kind of Different as Me is not necessarily a book I'd recommend for its theology, it is a book that I'd recommend for a stirring and unforgettable story, and for the pure joy of reading it. This one caught me by surprise and I enjoyed every minute of it. I can pretty well guarantee that someone will buy the movie rights to this story, so why not buy it now so you can say that you read the book before you ever heard of the movie!
Amazing August 2, 2006
R. L. Whitney (Franklin, TN)
42 out of 43 found this review helpful
I finished this book in less than 3 days. I was taken in by chapter 2 and laughed, cried, pondered, and repented the whole way through. It is well written and easy to digest yet full of hidden treasures.
I like that this book challenges those of us who consider ourselves Christian - that we usually aren't as real as we say and certainly rarely have actions that are as revolutionary as Jesus paved the way for.
Both authors are honest in their struggles with themselves, their histories, weaknesses and the strength found in their purpose together.
I most admire that they consider making a difference in one life, and the difference one life can make, important.
This is one of the two most powerful books I have read in my lifetime. November 3, 2006
Julie Cook (Fort Worth, Texas)
17 out of 17 found this review helpful
A friend gave me this book and told me it would "change my life" but I had no idea to what extent!
Having been raised in Fort Wotth, as a young girl, I can remember going to the Union Gospel Mission to help with services for the homeless. They had to attend a service in order to enjoy a free meal. I remember it as being one of the dirtiest, stinkiest and scariest places I had ever seen.
This book takes place at that very mission. It is the true, but almost unbelievable story of three very different people whose lives come together in a way that can only be explained as "God ordained". The things that happen in the lives of these three people are so amazing that you will not be able to put the book down. I have a new love and appreciation for the Union Gospel Mission. It has now become a beautiful place to me...an annointed place where needy people can find food, shelter, love and then come face to face with Jesus.
You will be challenged to look at life differently. I will never be the same since reading this book. I have a new empathy for the underpriveleged in this country. I have a new desire to spend time with the Lord.
This is a book that needs to be read by the masses. I began praying immediately that someone who had the means would make a movie of this story. I have since talked with Ron Hall and it seems that a movie may be in the future.
Denver Moore, the homeless man in the book may be used by God as one of His most faithful messengers of the truth for our time.
Grab a cup of coffee, find a comfortable chair and begin reading. You will be there all night or until you finish it. Grab a box of kleenex, too. You will need it!
You will then want to buy it for everyone you know for Christmas!
Get ready to be changed!!!!
 Not my cup of tea... January 20, 2008
Kaeli Vandertulip (Irving, TX USA)
16 out of 50 found this review helpful
A professor is assigning this to her class and I need to know it well enough to help the students with it. So I read it. Very early on, I realized something very important-I am not the target audience for this book. I despise books written in any deep-accent (one of the reasons I dislike Twain, and only his characters spoke that way). I also think our students are poor enough writers. They don't need this as an influence. I also can't stand any book that paints Texans with the same broad brush. But most of all, even if it was a true story, I don't care for books in which a person's reason for doing something is a hallucination or dream. I also dislike it when one's bad life is solely attributed to race-the line of "sharecroppers" ended in my family two generations ago, so I've heard a number of these stories from very white grandparents.
That being said, as a librarian, I would recommend this book to people who do like inspirational stories, especially from a Christian perspective and people interested in racial tensions in the South. I'm sure many people read this as a redemptive and inspirational book about the way faith and persistence can change lives, one at a time. For me, the only way the novel could have been more painful was if it gave me paper cuts on every page.
Pretty shallow, but it may have its place February 24, 2008
Objecta
16 out of 58 found this review helpful
I read this book because it was chosen as the ONE CITY/ONE BOOK choice for my city. Literature, it is not. Thoughtful? No way! This book reminds me of when I was a teenager lying on the couch fantasizing about climbing Mount Everest as I read the National Geographic with my feet propped up. I expect its readers will fantasize about developing a meaningful cross-cultural relationship and go on to something else in a few weeks. Ron Hall is a very rich art dealer whose wife Debbie befriended an illiterate street man and more or less involved Ron before dying of cancer. Apparently Ron wrote the story while dealing with his grief, added Denver's words (partly in dialect) using a tape recorder or something, got a third person to fix it up somewhat, and published it as a vanity publication. How, why, or on what terms Thomas Nelson later picked it up is not clear. I personally was uninspired by the way it glossed over all the hard and meaningful social questions and by the apparent ego-trip for Ron. I also found it poorly written and really fuzzy when it came to details about things like whether Denver ever learned to read and what can be done about today's deprived children. On the other hand, I did eventually climb mountains in Nepal. Maybe this book can plant the first seeds of some worthwhile questions for young people who would not have otherwise thought outside of their bubble.
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