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The Shack Click title to read excerpt or buy from CBD.com By William P. Young / Windblown Reviewed by Gail WelbornThis poignant story of relationship and spiritual hunger will take you into another dimension and provide an alternative view of God.Mack, short for Mackenzie Allen Phillips, was an ordinary man in his mid-fifties, about to have an extraordinary experience with God. He was married to Nan, a woman he'd grown to love more with each passing year. In particular, he liked how Nan referred to God as "Papa," and he knew she shared a deep intimacy with Him to be on such personal terms. Although Mack knew God, he wasn't that familiar with Him, but would like to be. The Phillips shared five children and loved each one the best. From Jon, recently married, and Tyler, working on his master's degree and living on campus, to Josh and Kate, who lived at home and attended a local community college, to adorable Missy. Missy came late into their family as an unexpected delight, and at six years old, she stole everyone's heart. Her engaging smile and effervescent personality lightened the darkest of days. Nan's nightly prayers with Missy had birthed an innocence and closeness with Jesus in her young child, which was very similar to her own experience. Late one fall, Mack planned to take Josh, Kate and Missy camping to Oregon's Wallowa Lake State Park. The recreation area was primitive and known to those who lived there as the gateway to Eagle Cap Wilderness and Hell's Canyon. Their family frequently vacationed there-Nan was scheduled to teach that weekend, and their two older sons were at school. Mack felt that as a middle-aged dad, he could surely manage three kids by himself. Normally he could-but, not this time. Two of his children would be threatened and one would be abducted and brutally murdered before the weekend ended. He couldn't know that the weekend would birth what he would come to call The Great Sadness that would forever change his life and his view of God-until four years later, when "Papa" left him a note in his mailbox, inviting him to The Shack where it all began. An invitation that would challenge his beliefs, astound his senses, and transform him in ways he couldn't imagine. Written with exquisite emotional detail, the chapters end with such excitement and intrigue the pages-and time- slip by without notice. Don't start this compelling book until you have time to finish it. Author William (Willie) P. Young, was born in Canada, but currently resides in Oregon. As a child, his missionary parents raised him among stone-age tribes in the highlands of New Guinea, their mission field. Young suffered severe losses as a child and young adult and now lives in what he calls the "wastefulness of grace," with his family in the Pacific Northwest. I believe Young's rearing outside of our sophisticated culture was part of God's design to unleash his imagination so he could pen this unusual work that I expect to become a classic. I believe Young met his Divine appointment when he wrote this debut novel as a mystery wrapped within a fable which has been compared to John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress by Eugene Peterson, Professor Emeritus, Spiritual Theology, Regent College, Vancouver, B.C. This poignant story of relationship and spiritual hunger will take you into another dimension and provide an alternative view of God. It has the potential to heal and change readers with its intimacy-spiritual daring-and literary integrity. The Shack will equip readers to comprehend God's presence in a powerful new way. |
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About Gail Welborn |
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We live in a world where 'normal' does not truly exist except as an idea or concept. For each of us, where and how we grew up plays a foundational role in our sense of 'normal', and only when we begin to experience the 'bigness and diversity' of the world are we tempted to evaluate our roots. I thought the way I grew up was 'normal' but I think most would probably agree that my history and journey have been a bit unusual. I was the eldest of four, born May 11th, 1955, in Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada, but the majority of my first decade was lived with my missionary parents in the highlands of Netherlands New Guinea (West Papua), among the Dani, a technologically stone age tribal people. These became my family and as the first white child and outsider who ever spoke their language, I was granted unusual access into their culture and community. Although at times a fierce warring people, steeped in the worship of spirits and even occasionally practicing ritualistic cannibalism, they also provided a deep sense of identity that remains an indelible element of my character and person. By the time I was flown away to boarding school at age 6, I was in most respects a white Dani. In the middle of a school year, my family unexpectedly returned to the West. My father worked as a Pastor for a number of small churches in Western Canada and by the time I graduated, I had already attended thirteen different schools. I paid my way through Bible College working as a radio disc jockey, lifeguard and even a stint in the oil fields of northern Alberta. I spent one summer in the Philippines and another touring with a drama troupe before working in Washington D.C. at Fellowship House, an international guest house. Completing my undergraduate degree in Religion, I graduated summa cum laude from Warner Pacific College in Portland, Oregon. The following year, I met and married Kim Warren and for a time worked on staff at a large suburban church while attending seminary. I have owned businesses and worked for others in diverse industries, from insurance to construction, venture capital companies to telecom, contract work to food processing; whatever was needed to help feed and house my growing family. I have always been a writer, whether songs, poetry, short stories or newsletters; never for public consumption but for friends and family. While I have extensively written for business, creating web content, business plans, white papers etc., |
Read more about William at: www.windrumors.com.
Books By William
| The Shack Click title to read excerpt or buy from CBD.com Mackenzie Allen Philips' youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his "Great Sadness," Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend. Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever. In a world where religion seems to grow increasingly irrelevant "The Shack" wrestles with the timeless question, "Where is God in a world so filled with unspeakable pain?" The answers Mack gets will astound you and perhaps transform you as much as it did him. You'll want everyone you know to read this book! |
©2006-09
Susan Sleeman
Susan Sleeman
is the author of Nipped in the Bud, available May of 2009 from Heartsong Presents: Mysteries, an imprint of Barbour Publishing.
