Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
One World (2011), Edition: Reprint, 250 pages
Description
Two kids with the same name were born blocks apart in the same decaying city within a few years of each other. One grew up to be a Rhodes Scholar, army officer, White House Fellow, and business leader. The other is serving a life sentence in prison. Here is the story of two boys and the journey of a generation.
User reviews
LibraryThing member msf59
The author, a Rhodes scholar, turned investment banker, spots an article in a Baltimore newspaper, detailing the criminal life of one Wes Moore, who is currently serving a life sentence for a robbery, in which a police officer was killed. Moore, the writer, is immediately intrigued. It turns out
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this other young man was raised in a similar inner-city neighborhood, actually just blocks away from his own. They were also both brought up by single mothers. Moore decides to contact this man in prison and find out his story. This is an excellent examination of how lives can be altered by the slightest differences; sometimes a simple choice or a chance meeting. Moore also explores these dangerous and tragic streets, where a boy has very little opportunity to succeed. A well-written memoir and one I highly recommend. Show Less
LibraryThing member tututhefirst
I grew up and went to school in Baltimore and the short length of this book made this a perfect trial. Besides, it was a well-written and poignant story. Wes Moore is the name of two different black men who were both born in Baltimore, who both lost their fathers at a very early age, and who were
The two did not know each other until the author read about the arrest of the other Wes Moore. As he heard about the background of the suspect/later convicted felon, he began to ponder the similarities in their lives and asked himself what made the difference in their lives. His initial letter to Wes the prisoner led to many visits where the two men began to delve into their backgrounds and differences. Wes the prisoner blames no one but himself. Wes the journalist is able to see how the strong male role models in his life, and the chances he was afforded because of those men, gave him opportunities which he was fortunate enough to take advantage of. Both men agree that a country that values youth, instead of fearing them, that helps them look at a future that has options will help youth overcome the helplessness so many feel today.
Wes the author was fortunate enough to have grandparents who mortgaged their house to pay his tuition to a private military academy after he got into trouble in the public schools. He hated it at first, but eventually flourished under the structure and discipline and mentoring of the military veterans who ran the school. He quotes one of his role models at the school:
When it is time for your to leave this school, leave this job or leave this earth, you make sure that you have worked hard enough to make sure that it mattered that you were even here."
The author goes on to add "...the notion that life is transient, that it can come and go quickly...has been with me since I had seen my father die....the idea of life's impermanence underlined everything for kids my age--it drove some of us to a paralyzing apathy, stopped us from even thinking too far into the future."
Neither Wes has a definitive answer why each made the choices he did. Wes the prisoner has embraced Islam, and is accepting of his fate. He sees his four children occasionally, but finds those visits only amplify his sense of helplessness in being able to influence their lives. Wes the author is enjoying a successful career as a journalist, served with the Army in Afghanistan, and as been fortunate enough to have adventures around the world.
The book has an extensive appendix listing programs that help youth at risk, and urges adults to become involved. It is left for the reader to decide the reasons for the different paths of each, and to decide how he or she can help.
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raised by hard-working single mothers. They each had siblings, they both were encouraged to stay in school, they both had early run-ins with law enforcement, but one of them became a Rhodes scholar and intern to Condeleeza Rice, the other is spending the rest of his life in a maximum security prison without hope of parole for his part in a robbery gone bad in which a Baltimore policeman was killed.The two did not know each other until the author read about the arrest of the other Wes Moore. As he heard about the background of the suspect/later convicted felon, he began to ponder the similarities in their lives and asked himself what made the difference in their lives. His initial letter to Wes the prisoner led to many visits where the two men began to delve into their backgrounds and differences. Wes the prisoner blames no one but himself. Wes the journalist is able to see how the strong male role models in his life, and the chances he was afforded because of those men, gave him opportunities which he was fortunate enough to take advantage of. Both men agree that a country that values youth, instead of fearing them, that helps them look at a future that has options will help youth overcome the helplessness so many feel today.
Wes the author was fortunate enough to have grandparents who mortgaged their house to pay his tuition to a private military academy after he got into trouble in the public schools. He hated it at first, but eventually flourished under the structure and discipline and mentoring of the military veterans who ran the school. He quotes one of his role models at the school:
When it is time for your to leave this school, leave this job or leave this earth, you make sure that you have worked hard enough to make sure that it mattered that you were even here."
The author goes on to add "...the notion that life is transient, that it can come and go quickly...has been with me since I had seen my father die....the idea of life's impermanence underlined everything for kids my age--it drove some of us to a paralyzing apathy, stopped us from even thinking too far into the future."
Neither Wes has a definitive answer why each made the choices he did. Wes the prisoner has embraced Islam, and is accepting of his fate. He sees his four children occasionally, but finds those visits only amplify his sense of helplessness in being able to influence their lives. Wes the author is enjoying a successful career as a journalist, served with the Army in Afghanistan, and as been fortunate enough to have adventures around the world.
The book has an extensive appendix listing programs that help youth at risk, and urges adults to become involved. It is left for the reader to decide the reasons for the different paths of each, and to decide how he or she can help.
Show Less
LibraryThing member karieh
I love “What If?” type stories…or ones that involve seemingly impossible coincidences or amazing twists of fate. They grab my imagination in a very special way. “The Other Wes Moore” is that type of story…except that it is true and that much of it is a real life tragedy. Two boys are
This book was compelling as it outlined the eerie similarities between the two boys. Both were from Baltimore, both grew up without a father, both had brushes with the law at an early age…yet their ultimate fates could hardly be more different.
The Wes Moore who authored the book says in many different ways and at different points in the story that “there but for the grace of God, go I”. He describes the two lives in a parallel fashion so that the reader can see the larger picture about the life for young black men in their time and place…and so that the reader might be able to pick up the variety of small choices and acts of luck that seem to make the two paths diverge.
“…the real discovery was that our two stories together helped us to untangle some of the larger story of our generation of young men, boys who came of age during a historically chaotic and violent time and emerged to succeed and fail in unprecedented ways.”
Neither Wes, nor the reader, is able to pint to one specific moment that made the difference. There are so many little things…there’s no recipe for “here’s what causes someone to become a criminal, and here’s what makes someone succeed in life”. That would be too easy. Instead, “This book is meant to show how, for those of us that live in the most precarious places in this country, our destinies can be determined by a single stumble down the wrong path, or a tentative step down the right one.”
This is a heartbreaking story, and an amazing one. It was difficult for me to put the book down, knowing that there are so many other children who through circumstance or chance stand at the crossroads of two paths. While one may seem the best one to take at the time, so many other factors determine where that path will lead. And so many times, that first step may seem small, but in fact becomes a leap over a chasm that cannot be recrossed.
Fate, or destiny or luck or divine chance…no one will ever know. From this story I can only take the repeated theme that while one may work hard, and have the best intentions and make the best choices available to them, but things happen in life that are beyond our control. Sometimes those things don’t matter, sometime if we make a wrong choice, the consequences are small…but:
“I guess it’s hard sometimes to distinguish between second chances and last chances.”
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born, both named Wes Moore, and sharing many other similarities. One ends up in prison for armed robbery and one becomes a Rhodes Scholar. As that Wes Moore says at the beginning and end of the book, “The chilling truth is that his story could have been mine. The tragedy is that my story could have been his.”This book was compelling as it outlined the eerie similarities between the two boys. Both were from Baltimore, both grew up without a father, both had brushes with the law at an early age…yet their ultimate fates could hardly be more different.
The Wes Moore who authored the book says in many different ways and at different points in the story that “there but for the grace of God, go I”. He describes the two lives in a parallel fashion so that the reader can see the larger picture about the life for young black men in their time and place…and so that the reader might be able to pick up the variety of small choices and acts of luck that seem to make the two paths diverge.
“…the real discovery was that our two stories together helped us to untangle some of the larger story of our generation of young men, boys who came of age during a historically chaotic and violent time and emerged to succeed and fail in unprecedented ways.”
Neither Wes, nor the reader, is able to pint to one specific moment that made the difference. There are so many little things…there’s no recipe for “here’s what causes someone to become a criminal, and here’s what makes someone succeed in life”. That would be too easy. Instead, “This book is meant to show how, for those of us that live in the most precarious places in this country, our destinies can be determined by a single stumble down the wrong path, or a tentative step down the right one.”
This is a heartbreaking story, and an amazing one. It was difficult for me to put the book down, knowing that there are so many other children who through circumstance or chance stand at the crossroads of two paths. While one may seem the best one to take at the time, so many other factors determine where that path will lead. And so many times, that first step may seem small, but in fact becomes a leap over a chasm that cannot be recrossed.
Fate, or destiny or luck or divine chance…no one will ever know. From this story I can only take the repeated theme that while one may work hard, and have the best intentions and make the best choices available to them, but things happen in life that are beyond our control. Sometimes those things don’t matter, sometime if we make a wrong choice, the consequences are small…but:
“I guess it’s hard sometimes to distinguish between second chances and last chances.”
Show Less
LibraryThing member TooBusyReading
Two men with the same name grew up in similar situations: black kids from the bad neighborhoods of crime-ridden Baltimore without fathers in their lives, with mothers who loved them and did they best they could, parallel lives that turned out very differently. One is serving life in prison for his
Wes, the author, got lucky in that when he was on the wrong track, his mother followed through on her threats and sent him to military school. She managed with difficulty to scrape up the money, helped by her family. Not everyone would be able to do that. Without that, Wes might have followed the path of least resistance and become like the other Wes. After a rocky start in military school, Wes did well there, eventually gaining admittance and a scholarship to Johns Hopkins despite his sub-par grades.
The other Wes chose to drop out of school even though that was not a necessity, started running drugs for the easy money, and had four children that he didn't want to raise, leaving two of them with their drug-addicted mother. As happens too often, the grandmother was left to raise his children. Ten years into his life sentence, the other Wes is now a “devout Muslim.”
Making the right choices in such bad circumstances is hard, extremely hard, but it can be done. Still, the other Wes repeatedly made the easy choices, the wrong choices. Unfortunately, the other Wes is paying for these choices by spending his life in prison, a waste of a life. His children are growing up without their father. Even sadder, Bruce Prothero, his victim, has no life and his children are growing up without their father.
The book, while giving quite a bit of detail, does not really address the differences in the two paths with any depth, letting the reader draw his or her own conclusions. And for all the jailhouse visits with the other Wes, there isn't as much insight into his life as I expected. The text of my ARC copy ends on page 177, but there are another 65 or so pages of Resource Guide, listing various organizations that can help. That will be a help to people looking for some answers, but I think this book could have done more to emphasize the changes that need to be made and can be made.
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involvement in killing a policeman who was moonlighting as a security guard to support his family. The other attended Johns Hopkins and Oxford, was a Rhodes scholar, served in Afghanistan, and generally has lead a very successful life. Why the differences? Wes, the author, got lucky in that when he was on the wrong track, his mother followed through on her threats and sent him to military school. She managed with difficulty to scrape up the money, helped by her family. Not everyone would be able to do that. Without that, Wes might have followed the path of least resistance and become like the other Wes. After a rocky start in military school, Wes did well there, eventually gaining admittance and a scholarship to Johns Hopkins despite his sub-par grades.
The other Wes chose to drop out of school even though that was not a necessity, started running drugs for the easy money, and had four children that he didn't want to raise, leaving two of them with their drug-addicted mother. As happens too often, the grandmother was left to raise his children. Ten years into his life sentence, the other Wes is now a “devout Muslim.”
Making the right choices in such bad circumstances is hard, extremely hard, but it can be done. Still, the other Wes repeatedly made the easy choices, the wrong choices. Unfortunately, the other Wes is paying for these choices by spending his life in prison, a waste of a life. His children are growing up without their father. Even sadder, Bruce Prothero, his victim, has no life and his children are growing up without their father.
The book, while giving quite a bit of detail, does not really address the differences in the two paths with any depth, letting the reader draw his or her own conclusions. And for all the jailhouse visits with the other Wes, there isn't as much insight into his life as I expected. The text of my ARC copy ends on page 177, but there are another 65 or so pages of Resource Guide, listing various organizations that can help. That will be a help to people looking for some answers, but I think this book could have done more to emphasize the changes that need to be made and can be made.
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LibraryThing member Eliz12
This is a very well-written and compelling, but ultimately unsatisfying book.
The author begins with a premise: two boys, same name, with much in common. Yet one goes to prison for attempted murder and the other becomes a tremendous success.
We come to learn a great deal about the situations that
The author begins with a premise: two boys, same name, with much in common. Yet one goes to prison for attempted murder and the other becomes a tremendous success.
We come to learn a great deal about the situations that
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ultimately contributed to the distinct differences in the boys' lives, but very little about the boys' own decisions and motivations, fears and changes. I wanted more. Show Less
LibraryThing member pamdierickx
The Other Wes Moore: Two boys same name - one ends up in jail, one ends up a Fellow to Condaleeza Rice in Washington DC. What was the difference between the two boys? What happened? How can WE help so that more poor black men and others stay out of the drug business and end up incarcerated for the
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rest of their lives. Show Less
LibraryThing member kristi17
An interesting story about two people with same names and similar childhoods, but I think the comparisons were overrated. According to the author, their lives deviated based on seemingly small decisions and luck. But their backgrounds, support structure, and core morals were much different so it
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made sense to me how their stories turned out. I felt as if the author was talking about his own accomplishments too much, giving himself a pat on the back. I would have liked more analysis and interview excerpts. Show Less
LibraryThing member Onnaday
I read this book for my book club. This book parallels the lives of two young men with the same name, one into triumph, the other into tragedy. It chronicles the different choices made throughout their young lives and the different influencing people with whom they became associated. I feel the
Wes Moore, the author did his research and provided statistics on socioeconomic conditions and how it can affect your life. In other words, it’s a very instructive case study on how class mechanisms work in America.
I was slightly confused, but the confusion cleared up quickly as I caught on to the fact that the author is the Wes Moore writing in the first person while the "other" Wes Moore is being written about in the third person. Actually, it was a brilliant and logical way for the author to convey how easily his life was so similar to the other character’s life and he could have easily taken the same path in life and become a statistic.
I would have liked to have gotten more in-sight into his own life, particularly in his teen-age and later years’. However, his personal triumph over adversity is what made this book a good read.
This book stimulated great conversations amongst our book group about how it’s important to help a generation of boys choose a productive path in life instead of a life of crime and that parent involvement can make all the difference to our children’s future.
Communicated well, this book makes you think.
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difference is in the ways that their mothers lived their own lives and reacted to what their sons were doing.Wes Moore, the author did his research and provided statistics on socioeconomic conditions and how it can affect your life. In other words, it’s a very instructive case study on how class mechanisms work in America.
I was slightly confused, but the confusion cleared up quickly as I caught on to the fact that the author is the Wes Moore writing in the first person while the "other" Wes Moore is being written about in the third person. Actually, it was a brilliant and logical way for the author to convey how easily his life was so similar to the other character’s life and he could have easily taken the same path in life and become a statistic.
I would have liked to have gotten more in-sight into his own life, particularly in his teen-age and later years’. However, his personal triumph over adversity is what made this book a good read.
This book stimulated great conversations amongst our book group about how it’s important to help a generation of boys choose a productive path in life instead of a life of crime and that parent involvement can make all the difference to our children’s future.
Communicated well, this book makes you think.
Show Less
LibraryThing member joannemepham29
I enjoyed this memoir very much, as as a fellow Baltimorian I could relate to many of the references and stories about Baltimore County and City. I was impressed by the life the author Wes Moore ended up living, because he is correct i saying many underprivileged young people end up in prison, on
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drugs or dead. Baltimore has made progress, but still has a long way to go, but is a wonderful city with wonderful people. I also thought it was very courageous for Mr. Moore to approach the Other Mr. Moore to talk to him, and vice versus for the imprisoned Mr. Moore to be so open and honest. I hope Mr. Moore in prison finds peace, forgiveness and happiness despite where he is. Show Less
LibraryThing member ruthiekro
Two young men from nearly identical backgrounds, both named Wes Moore, have hugely different futures ahead of them. One is a Rhodes scholar, successful businessman, and motivational speaker. The other, a former drug dealer and convicted felony murderer, will spend the rest of his life in jail
More than just a look at a peculiar coincidence, or a case study in nature vs. nurture, this book looks beyond the two Wes Moores to others like them. It offers a lengthy resource guide of agencies and programs designed to help young people and challenges readers to consider and contribute to the futures of youth everywhere.
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without the possibility of parole. As young boys both struggled against the hopelessness of life in poor Baltimore neighborhoods experiencing disappointment and success. What caused their paths to diverge leading to such different ends? More than just a look at a peculiar coincidence, or a case study in nature vs. nurture, this book looks beyond the two Wes Moores to others like them. It offers a lengthy resource guide of agencies and programs designed to help young people and challenges readers to consider and contribute to the futures of youth everywhere.
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LibraryThing member alexann
Wes Moore had already begun to make a name for himself when he became aware of another young man named Wes Moore who had been sentenced to life in prison for his role in a hold-up where a man was killed. So he delved back into the origins of himself and the other Wes Moore to try to discover where
Although he claims not to be gloating it gets tiring to hear the author tell the reader how great his life is and about all the wonderful opportunities he's had. Just not as good as I had hoped.
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their paths diverged. The really fascinating thing is just how similar their lives were! Raised by single moms and grandparents, growing up on the streets of the projects, families trying to move away from the negative influences--one makes it out, and the other doesn't. Both families knew the importance of education--one family pushed their Wes even when he didn't care about school--they made good on their threat to send him to military school. Was that why one of them became a Rhodes Scholar and worked with Condeleeza Rice in the White House, and the other is spending the rest of his life in prison? It's hard knowing.Although he claims not to be gloating it gets tiring to hear the author tell the reader how great his life is and about all the wonderful opportunities he's had. Just not as good as I had hoped.
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LibraryThing member schatzi
Although this book is an interesting glimpse into the lives of two very similar boys who grew up to be very different men, I found myself somehow disappointed as I finished reading it. I was expecting something more, although I'm not sure what exactly that was. It just wasn't as good as I thought
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that it would be. Show Less
LibraryThing member francissk
Interesting book, and incredibly dynamic speaker, if you ever get a chance to hear him. I think about this premise alot, what different choices and opportunities could have sent me down a completely different path. And how for alot of people, those choices/opportunities send them down a path with
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little or no ability to change that course. Show Less
LibraryThing member readyreader
This is an interesting, thought provoking story of two boys with the same name who went in different directions in their lives due to a variety of reasons. The book could have been a lot better; I felt the author skimmed over a lot of details that I wanted to know about both him and the other Wes.
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I expected there to be much more about their relationship but I think Mr. Moore really didn't "get to know" the other Wes; his story was simply used as a foil against his own. I also didn't feel I came to know the author either, rather just the facts. It seemed rushed and incomplete and I wish the writer would have taken more time to really give us a profound story of his life and the life of the other Wes Moore. Show Less
LibraryThing member HistReader
I found this book to be somewhat interesting, yet nowhere near groundbreaking. It was authored in a way to make it a fast read as well as being compelling.
While the author shared a name with a wayward counterpart, living only blocks apart in their early youth and never having met until the other
As the book progressed, I waited for admonition of the reader for perpetuating societal ills; the criticism never comes. Thankfully, aside from passing mentions, the book was neither political nor castigating. Wes Moore, the author, writes in a clinically emotionless pseudo-biography of his convict namesake.
I appreciated the author not attempting to garner sympathy for the imprisoned Wes Moore. We were not asked to assign blame to society or consider the prisoner Wes Moore a victim; he was simply a directionless youth who did not heed the hypocritical warnings of his older brother. In a refreshingly sense, the accomplished and respectable author does not even promote his path is the one, right way for everyone.
The Other Wes Moore is not a critical sociological evaluation of Black youth in America, the drug trade, fatherless homes in urban areas. The book is merely an interesting read of a personal reflection on two boys with a shared name who took two drastically different paths in life.
While the author shared a name with a wayward counterpart, living only blocks apart in their early youth and never having met until the other
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Wes Moore became "locally" infamous, I believe the impact of the coincidence had more significance on the author. As the book progressed, I waited for admonition of the reader for perpetuating societal ills; the criticism never comes. Thankfully, aside from passing mentions, the book was neither political nor castigating. Wes Moore, the author, writes in a clinically emotionless pseudo-biography of his convict namesake.
I appreciated the author not attempting to garner sympathy for the imprisoned Wes Moore. We were not asked to assign blame to society or consider the prisoner Wes Moore a victim; he was simply a directionless youth who did not heed the hypocritical warnings of his older brother. In a refreshingly sense, the accomplished and respectable author does not even promote his path is the one, right way for everyone.
The Other Wes Moore is not a critical sociological evaluation of Black youth in America, the drug trade, fatherless homes in urban areas. The book is merely an interesting read of a personal reflection on two boys with a shared name who took two drastically different paths in life.
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LibraryThing member richardderus
Rating: 3* of five
The Book Report: Chronic overachiever and Marine Wes Moore gets captivated by the fate of his fellow Baltimorean and convicted murderer Wes Moore. They meet and become friends, leading to this book.
My Review: More's the pity. This damn thing is like getting a sunshine enema. One
The author's breezy, anecdotal style is perfectly adequate to the task of telling his story. It's in no way unique or even very interesting, but the points are made, the language is limpidly clear, and I never once thought the publisher was crazy for acquiring but not copyediting the book. This is an increasingly rare feeling on my part.
So what's with the curmudgeonly reaction to it? I loathe being preached at. This book feels preachy and smug to me. I can almost feel Jesus in every word, and this is a most disturbing and disagreeable sensation to me.
I didn't like it, and I doubt I'd like either Wes Moore in the flesh either. I'm glad I read it, but I don't recommend it to anyone not in search of the Wonderbra experience: Uplifted beyond that which is natural (not to mention deisrable).
The Book Report: Chronic overachiever and Marine Wes Moore gets captivated by the fate of his fellow Baltimorean and convicted murderer Wes Moore. They meet and become friends, leading to this book.
My Review: More's the pity. This damn thing is like getting a sunshine enema. One
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feels far crappier about disliking this book than a mere novel, or a tendentious political screed from some libertarian or conservative wingnut.The author's breezy, anecdotal style is perfectly adequate to the task of telling his story. It's in no way unique or even very interesting, but the points are made, the language is limpidly clear, and I never once thought the publisher was crazy for acquiring but not copyediting the book. This is an increasingly rare feeling on my part.
So what's with the curmudgeonly reaction to it? I loathe being preached at. This book feels preachy and smug to me. I can almost feel Jesus in every word, and this is a most disturbing and disagreeable sensation to me.
I didn't like it, and I doubt I'd like either Wes Moore in the flesh either. I'm glad I read it, but I don't recommend it to anyone not in search of the Wonderbra experience: Uplifted beyond that which is natural (not to mention deisrable).
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LibraryThing member gaillamontagne
6 hours: A story of two kids from the same decaying neighborhood. One became a Rhodes Scholar and the other a convict with life imprisionment in jail. The narrative is told by the author in an alternate style of one
Wes' s life and then the other. The biography focuses on personal choice and
Wes' s life and then the other. The biography focuses on personal choice and
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responsibility but is not without sympathy toward the cold truth that he, the author, may have turned out the same as the Wes in jail. This book explores both perspectives of responsibility for our choices in any given situation and also life situations that lack opportunity compounded by the emotional impact that has to drive some people to very destructive outcomes. Very thought provoking and a must for anyone who works with a population of persons in poverty. Listened to it in one day. Show Less
LibraryThing member bookworm12
Two men named Wes Moore were raised in nearby streets in Baltimore. One Wes Moore earned a scholarship to a prestigious university, the other ended up in jail for life. They didn’t meet until their fates were already set, but the result is a fascinating nonfiction look at how they each ended up
I’ll admit there were times when I lost track of which Wes Moore’s story I was reading. They have the same name and had very similar lives when they were young. They were both tempted by drugs and violence and they both lost parents to death or abandonment.
The two things that really stood out were the fact that you have to make choices that are good for you and you are responsible for the decisions you make. Also, strong parents/family support is a huge factor in a child’s life. The mentors and leaders that step up in the lives of a young person make all the difference. It made me appreciate the work people do in tutoring and mentoring programs.
BOTTOM LINE: I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed this one. It’s a quick read and well-suited for audio. It wasn’t overly inspirational, just a realistic look at the possible outcome any life could have with just a few minor changes.
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there. I’ll admit there were times when I lost track of which Wes Moore’s story I was reading. They have the same name and had very similar lives when they were young. They were both tempted by drugs and violence and they both lost parents to death or abandonment.
The two things that really stood out were the fact that you have to make choices that are good for you and you are responsible for the decisions you make. Also, strong parents/family support is a huge factor in a child’s life. The mentors and leaders that step up in the lives of a young person make all the difference. It made me appreciate the work people do in tutoring and mentoring programs.
BOTTOM LINE: I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed this one. It’s a quick read and well-suited for audio. It wasn’t overly inspirational, just a realistic look at the possible outcome any life could have with just a few minor changes.
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LibraryThing member KamGeb
I thought I would love this book based on the description, but it fell short. It felt more like reading an essay than reading a novel. For some reason I thought it would read more like a novel. Also I felt like the author was trying too hard to say there was no difference between his family and the
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other Wes Moore's upbringing and family. But it just seemed he had a family that was more put together and didn't believe they were defeated and that was much different than the other Wes Moore. Show Less
LibraryThing member 2wonderY
The book has a great beginning and a strong ending. It bogs down a little in the middle as he tries to identify and encapsulate significant incidents of each of their lives.
The last chapter has a reflection which compares how young black men are viewed by their culture - in inner city America
The last chapter has a reflection which compares how young black men are viewed by their culture - in inner city America
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versus the townships of South Africa; both cultures plagued by poverty, prejudice and lack of opportunity. That was very striking and thought provoking. Show Less
LibraryThing member LibraryCin
The author, Wes Moore, grew up without a father and poor. He made decisions in his life, which helped him become very successful. Somewhere along the way, he heard of another Wes Moore who grew up without a father and poor, and at one time, they'd both lived in the same city. The other Wes Moore
This was very interesting, the different situations and/or decisions one can make to have things turn out so differently. This does make me thankful for all the little advantages I guess I had growing up, as well as thankful to be living in a pretty safe city in Canada. Yes, there are drugs and violence, of course, but not to the same extent, I don't think, as some cities in the U.S. It's also not long, so it's quick to read.
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was now in prison, so author Wes Moore wrote to him to find out more about him. With similar circumstances to start their lives, what could have caused their paths to divert so dramatically?This was very interesting, the different situations and/or decisions one can make to have things turn out so differently. This does make me thankful for all the little advantages I guess I had growing up, as well as thankful to be living in a pretty safe city in Canada. Yes, there are drugs and violence, of course, but not to the same extent, I don't think, as some cities in the U.S. It's also not long, so it's quick to read.
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LibraryThing member SeriousGrace
The concept of this book is really quite simple: two kids of the same age with the exact same name grew up in the same city within blocks of one another but ended up having very different lives. Author Wes Moore went on to be a Rhodes Scholar while the other Wes Moore became a convicted felon. Why?
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Scholar Wes Moore decided to find out. He contacted the other Wes Moore, first through letters then prison visits. The result is a gut-wrenching memoir about coming of age fatherless in the crime-ridden streets of Baltimore. Show Less
LibraryThing member wbc3
Wikipedia describes Wes Moore as an American author, businessman, and US Army veteran. He was a Rhodes Scholar and by most definitions is very successful. He grew up in Baltimore, just a few blocks away from another Wes Moore of similar age who currently is in prison serving a life sentence for
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murder. Moore spent a lot of time interviewing the “other” Wes Moore in prison as well as other members of both their families. His book looks at the similarities and differences between their lives based on that research. He examines what made one Wes Moore a success and the other a convicted murderer. The book is a fascinating and uncomfortable exploration. While I’m not sure of the conclusions (nor do I think that he is), the book is worth reading for anyone interested in the lives of children and young adults in the inner city. Show Less
LibraryThing member PeskyLibrary
“The Other Wes Moore” is a remarkable story about the very different lives of two young men with the same name who grew up in the same era. One Wes Moore was given educational opportunities at a young age and the other was in a way “left to fend for himself” in the streets of Baltimore. The
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two meet at prison at the request of the free Wes Moore and their stories are chronicled through an unlikely friendship that was forged. It was a great read and I would recommend it to everyone! -Tracy, Faculty- Show Less
LibraryThing member Narshkite
This is not a perfect book. The lens is ridiculously skewed in a manner to assign the other Wes Moore no responsibility for his actions, but there are some profound insights and it is a compelling story. The primary Wes Moore is an inspiration, a boy on the edge who grew to be a truly fine man. He
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is a testament to what a loving family willing to sacrifice, real discipline, and a great education can do for a child. I know many of the studies out there, I graduated with a degree in criminology, and though I ultimately chose to go to law school rather than continuing in that area I try to keep up. Still, seeing this sharp contrast between two boys and then two men, and seeing how certain choices and opportunities changed the game, gave shape to many of my opinions. I am handing this one over to my 14 year old for sure Show Less
Awards
Eliot Rosewater Indiana High School Book Award (Nominee — 2013)
NCSLMA Battle of the Books (High School — 2018)
BCALA Literary Awards (Winner — Nonfiction — 2011)
ALA Outstanding Books for the College Bound (Social Sciences)
Physical description
250 p.; 7.98 inches
ISBN
0385528205 / 9780385528207