The Shack

by William Paul Young

Hardcover

Published July 1, 2008

About the author

Wm. Paul Young is a Canadian author. Young was the oldest of four. He spend the majority of his first decade with his missionary parents in the highlands of Netherlands New Guinea (West Papua), among the Dani, a tribal people. When he was six he was sent to a boarding school.

The manuscript, that later became The Shack, was intended only for his six kids and for a handful of close friends. After multiple rejections by publishers, Young and his friends published the book under the name of their newly created publishing company. The Shack was one of the top-selling fiction books of 2008 and will be a major motion picture in Spring 2017.

Young lives in Happy Valley, Oregon with his wife and has six children and several grandchildren. He is also the author of Crossroads, Eve and the non-fiction book, Lies We Believe About God.

Reviews

[Marikate Costello · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first few chapters of this book are SO good. Then, once you’re a couple of chapters in, this book turns COMPLETELY religious. With that being said, I have to say, even if you’re not totally religious, this book is still worth reading. It’s extremely well written (at certain points it’s like you can feel the emotions of the characters) and loaded with really insightful messages/lessons that can apply to really any type of hardship someone might be facing. I will say however that if you’re absolutely not any type of religious/don’t really believe in anything, you probably won’t like this book. Personally, I didn’t expect to like this book, but I really did and I’m really glad I read it!

[Allison · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the worst book I have read since attempting Fifty Shades of Grey over a decade ago. I would have DNF'd after the first 80 pages but, this being a huge bestseller, I truly thought it was going to get better (it didn't) or surprise with some major illuminating twist (it didn't). The writing is atrociously amateur, the story cheesy, nonsense pseudo-religion voiced by a Boomer who thinks they are worldly because they wrote the "God" figure as a black woman and Jesus with dark skin. The first few chapters gave me hope with an intriguing true-crime tone, then it veered into diluted churchy nothingness masquerading as a spiritual journey... for the remaining 3/4 of the book.
Do not read this.

[Lindsey Cotten · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh. Story was good; writing (especially dialogue) was tragic; went too deep into the philosophy at times.