Composition Michelle Batan
Book Report July 26, 2010
The Shack
The Shack was written by William P. Young. This book is fiction and contains about 246 pages. There are no exact settings in the book
Mack Phillips is a depressed man. One day, he received a letter from Papa telling him to go back to the place where his daughter was murdered by the "Little Ladykiller." The "Little Ladykiller" is the one that kidnaps young girls and leaving a ladybug pin with dots. The dots represent each girl that has been kidnapped and murdered. There were five dots on it. Mack's daughter, Missy, was the 5th one. It was during their camping trip. It was during when her brother and sister went canoeing. All of a sudden, they had trouble with the canoe. They both fell in the river and Mack, being the father jumped in to save them. Meanwhile, leaving Missy on the bench coloring. When he came back, she wasn't there. He looked everywhere but she was nowhere in sight. They called the police, but in the end, they found her dress covered in blood in a shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Mack and his family were shattered. But he was the only one that has not moved on. For 4 years in his life, he had what was called "The Great Sadness." When he got the letter telling him to go back to the shack if he wanted to, he got enraged. But he also contemplated if he should go. And the letter said from "Papa." He remembered how his wife Nan would call God "Papa," her favorite nickname for Him. He found out it was from God. At first he thought it was some kind of trick. He decided to go on a winter Saturday. His friend went to him and brought him a gun and some shells. He took them with him just in case. When he got to the shack, all of his horrible memories flooded back. He apologized to Missy, though, dead. He walked out after that. As he was walking, all of the snow around him started to melt. Plants and flowers started to grow instead. At last, to his amazement, the shack started to form into a hut.
When he came in, he met 3 different people. They were the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. But they were in person. Their names are Elouisa, Jesus, and Sarayu. Elouisa was Papa, the one who wrote and sent the letter to Mack. Jesus was the Hebrew, from the house of Judah. Sarayu, was the Keeper of the Gardens. Mack asked who was God, they all replied in one unison "I am." They were the ones trying to help Mack move on with his life and that Missy's death was the past.
An admiring phrase in the book
"No matter what God's power may be, the first aspect of God is never
that of the absolute Master, the Almighty. It is that of the God who puts
himself on our human level and limits himself."
I liked this phrase because it tells us that just because that God is the Almighty Creator of the world, he sometimes limits himself himself and acts almost as if he's only a human being.
I highly recommend this book to many students. It is a very fascinating and mind-blowing book. It taught me to move on with my life and to stop living in the past. Life is too short to be living with regrets. We should always forgive and forget and to leave the rest to God in the future.
