The Shack

This book was kewl. I've been hearing people rave about this book for months, so I decided I finally had to read *cue suspense music* The Shack by Wm. Paul Young. I mean, even my Grandpa Chuck loved this book, and if he loved it, it's almost guaranteed a good read. He actually was the one who gave me my copy.
The Shack is about Mack Phillips, who had five kids: Kate, Josh, Tyler, Jon, and Missy. I say "had" because Mack now has four kids: while on a camping trip, his youngest, Missy, age six, was abducted by the serial killer known as The Little Ladykiller. There was no evidence, clues, DNA, or anything until they found Missy's torn, bloody sundress that she had disappeared in in a shack off a little road out in the middle of nowhere. Missy was now officially presumed dead. Around this time, Mack gave up his faith in God.
Flash forward to a few years later. Mack is being affected by "The Great Sadness," as he calls it, neglects to have faith in anything, and slowly his life is detiorating. Then one day, he gets a note supposedly from God, telling him to come to the Shack to get reacquainted. Against his better judgment, Mack goes. What he finds will forever change his life and yours.
I don't want to reveal too much, but let me just say that the outlook the author has on religion in this book is astounding. I've never heard God described in quite this way. First of all, in the Shack Mack does actually meet God: in the form of three people. First, there's Papa, known as the Father, who's actually a plump, welcoming African lady. Then there's Jesus, who is pretty much everything you'd expect your picture of Jesus to be only Jewish. (Isn't it sad that all our conceptions of religious figures are usually white?) Last, there's the Holy Spirit, named Sarayu for the wind. She's a petite Asian woman who loves to garden and moves in rainbows, if that makes sense. These characters teach Mack everything about God, his life, his relationships, and give him the answers he desperately needed to save his humanity.
I thought this book was going to be all religious-lovey-dovey, and actually avoid the issues that we all thought the book would answer, but it wasn't like that at all. As an almost-nonreligious person, I can honestly say this book changes your whole outlook on life. In a good way.