Review of "The Shack" by William Young

I loved this book. It wasn't well written (you are not surprised to find that William is a first time author), but the story and the depth outshines all it's flaws. It is not a easy read. I had to put it down several times as I couldn't take the images in my mind and I cried several times but I laughed even more.

The story is based around a fictional character, Mack, and his weekend with Elousia (El - semitic for God; ousia ancient Greek for being), Sarayo (Sanskrit for wind), & Jesus. The chapters leading up to the weekend will turn many away as it isn't a pleasant story. Make sure you have a box of tissues in easy reach for chapters 2-4.

Each chapter has a quote at the head. I liked each one. My favorites are:

Chapter 4: "Sadness is a wall between two gardens." -Kahlil Gibran

Chapter 6: "...no matter what God's power may be, the first aspect of God is never that of absolute Master, the Almighty. It is that of of the God who puts himself on our human level and limits himself." -Jacques Ellul

Chapter 14: "God is a verb" -Buckminster Fuller

Chapter 18: "Faith never knows where it is being led, But it knows and loves the One who is leading." - Oswald Chambers

The meat of the book has some great lines as well:

"Who wants to worship a God who can be fully comprehended...Not much mystery in that."

"Faith does not grow in the house of certainty."

"There are a lot of smart people who are able to say a lot of the right things...but they don't know me at all. So really how can their answers be right...?"

For me this book has take the place of "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis as the best book for an introduction to Christianity. I plan on reading it again.

Addendum: The reason I read this book was because my father recommended it. He reminded me when we spoke :-)