Book For The Week: The Shack by William P Young

The Shack

by 

William P. Young

A father is devastated. His six year old daughter has been  murdered.  Taken from their campsite in broad daylight, all that is ever found of her is her blood stained dress in an old shack in the wilderness of Oregon.  Three years later this  father returns to the crime scene to wrestle with his grief and anger.  Paul Young (also known as William P Young)  authored the novel  The Shack as a gift to his adult children.  He wanted to explain to them his belief system and chose to use a fiction book as the medium to do so.   When evaluated from this perspective  The Shack  does a decent job of presenting the author's belief system in a clear way.  It also holds the readers attention because it has a story line that holds interest.    The book jumps on major life questions such as why tragedy is a part of our lives,  the concept of forgiving those that have hurt us deeply,  and the Christian imagery of the trinity.   Written from what seems to me to be a mainstream protestant view point,  this novel should hold a great deal of appeal to a large audience.   It would not appeal to conservative Christians.  There is no hellfire and brimstone  point of view in The Shack.   Two different colleagues at work suggested this book to me a couple of years ago.  It did not seem like my kind of book so I thanked them and told them  I appreciated their concern.  Then a few weeks ago Audible offered it for free so I went ahead and downloaded it.   After listening to the book I still am of the opinion that it is not my kind of book.   The belief system explained is one that has at its center a very personified deity.   My belief system has a creator that is more of a total sum of many parts.  The belief system of the book is one with an afterlife with recognizable intact loved ones in it.   My belief system is one in which after death many parts return to a creator to become again part of the total sum from which it came.  The belief system in the book is one where a deity intervenes while my belief system is one where intervention is carried out by  us taking care of one another.   The belief system described in the book is one based on emotion while I choose to reason through things.   Therefore,  while this is not going to make the top ten list of my favorite books for this year,  I would recommend it to quite a few friends who are mainstream Christians.    It is a well written book which holds the readers interest.  Click on the title and the author's name to follow the links to learn more.