To be sure I think the most similar language to rust would be probably c++. At least I get a distinct "created by c++ developers" whenever I use it.

Not that that is a bad thing, just that if you've programmed in almost any imperative language you're fine reading that online book. I'd love to use rust to replace my C stuff in the future if possible once it stabilizes. But until then I am just popping back to that book every other even .N release to have a look-see at progress.