The Shack by William P. Young

Book Description
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!

My thoughts
I had no idea when I picked up this book, that it was a spiritual story. I was intrigued by the abduction story and the father’s pain for the loss of his daughter. But that scene was just a small part of what the novel is about. William P. Young has written a unique story involving the Father, Son and the Holy Ghost and the transformation of a pained man and his quest for answers. I am not a religious person and probably would not have picked this book up, but am glad I did. “The Shack” is a great read for everyone, not just the truly religious. Did it make me want to go to church, no? But I helped me understand more about us as human beings and God. I am can not compare it to other novels of similar nature, but was truly moved.