Wanting to wrap up a thought I had (one of many) after finishing There are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in the Other America, by Alex Kotlowitz. This is a book that I am guessing most of my j-school classmates read back when we were in j-school. Kotlowitz is a professor at Northwestern and no doubt this is required reading for some undergrad classes. In his years as a journalist for The Wall Street Journal, writing about urban issues, he came to meet two young kids, Lafayette and Pharoah Rivers, living in the inner-city projects of Chicago. A few articles lead to writing a book about a two-year period in their young lives. You can’t even imagine what they go through, what their little eyes see and what their young minds must process.

The book was written in the early 90s, and it takes place in the late 80s. One of the kids, Lafayette, is the same age as me. It hits you, as Kotlowitz wants it to, because there is an entire other world out there, (when I lived in Chicago it couldn’t have been more than a few miles) that I never saw and never will see. It hits hard again because now that I’m a mother I hope and pray that my child will never, ever see or experience horrors like these children did.

This was written long before the Internet was something we took for granted. In no way, shape or form could the family Kotlowitz writes about have ever imagine a world where, upon finishing the book, any one can say to themselves, ‘I wondering Pharaoh and Lafayette are doing today … Google their names and find out.

I more or less did this when I finished the book (actually I waited a day. I nearly almost Googled — sorry, bing-ed them before finishing the book but restrained myself). Based on my search results, I am not the first, nor will I be the last to do the same thing.

Upon doing this, I wish I hadn’t. At the end of the book you are left with hope. Hope that at least one of them will find a life beyond the projects, and becomes that success story. It is better to just leave it there and stay hopeful. We want the story to continue. We are looking for the alternative ending. Instead we learn what their real last name is (Kotlowitz had used an alias). We learn that Pharoah was featured on “This American Life” ten years ago. We learn that the state of Illinois keeps an online database of convicted felons. And suddenly the alternative ending is not as good as the actual end of the book.

And, you, too, will wish that you hadn’t.

This very thing happened to me when I finished Annie Lamott’s Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son’s First Year. I Googled. Then wished I hadn’t. So sad that I was about it that I decided against reading another one of her books and removed it from my library hold queue.

This happened one more time this year, when I re-read A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers. This is a little different. You kind of know what Eggers has been doing. And, he kind of lets you know what Toph is up to (if you read the paperback version you get a little update). And, it’s not a sad ending … not even an alternate one.

Based on the search results I found, I know I’m not the only one thinking this and doing this. But, how sad have we become? That many readers out there demand to see into the lives of those who probably would prefer to remain anonymous. Almost think that they deserve it. Is reality TV to blame? The 24-hour news cycle? The always-at-your-fingertips Internet? Inquiring minds want to know.

BTW, all three of these books are such good reads, (well, AHWOSG, in my opinion, was much better the first time I read it, and I think it has something to do with the time in my life when I first picked up, compared to re-reading it ~10 years later). And I strongly urge you all to read these. And then to afterwards resist the temptation to try to find another ending.