The Shack by Wm Paul Young

Publisher: Windblown Media
Publish Date: June 2008
Pages: -
Format: Kobo
ISBN: 978- 0964729292

Mackenzie Allen Phillips’ 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 the shack for a weekend.

Against his better judgement he arrives at the shack on a wintery afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare.  What he finds there will change Mack’s world forever.

My Thoughts

This was a very challenging book to read, so much that I read half in May and the other half today.  You have to break it into two stories: the actual novel and the theological.

I had a tough time rating this one; first it was a 4, then a 2 then settled on 3.  There were parts that I really liked, parts that were ok and some parts left me thinking wtf? (Can I say that about a spiritual novel?)  I've been very back and forth about my feelings towards this book.  In my opinion it was not a well written novel, and seemed to be a little over the place and in a sense just sloppy.  I had very high hopes for this one and it fell a bit short.

The other aspect that I didn't like, and again this is just my personal opinion and preference, is I like closure at the end.  I'm not one of these people likes a storyline left "open for interpretation."  I prefer to have a  "pull me in" beginning, climactical middle and a drawing conclusion and delivered to me on beautiful crisp pages (or in this case neatly on my ereader.)  I'm not one to sit and have discussions on what I think happened in the end...although this is what I'm finding myself doing with a colleague.  I didn't love it, but I didn't hate it.  

My Rating: «««

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The reviews made here are my personal opinion. I’m not being paid to review any of these books. I am by no means a professional book reviewer or editor.  I do this for the love of books.