Review of a Review

I know, I know. Everyone loves this book. No fewer than forty-three people asked me "Have you read The Shack yet?"

Invariably, they responded to my negative response with something along the lines of "You have to! It changed my life! I was full of questions, and life stunk, and then I read the book, and God made sense to me, I understood quantum physics effortlessly, and all of a sudden I could spin flax into gold!"

So, what I'm about to say is going to make a lot of people pretty angry.

The Shack appears to me to be an ex-hippie's best attempt at amalgamating God, Dr. Phil, and Oprah. The writing is bad, the story is cheesy, the format is formulaic and cliche, and the theology is spotty and poorly explained at best, and downright heretical at worst.

I was not impressed. If it makes a lot of people think hard thoughts about God that they'd rather avoid, then I suppose that's fine. I'm just not sure hard thinking should be done at the expense of clear thinking. And I'm certain bad writing is no way to advance good theology (even if this were). 


    After reading this review and having read the book twice now, I would have to say I really agree with this review.  I think her summary description of the book being "an ex-hippie's best attempt at amalgamating God, Dr. Phil, and Oprah", is a bit extreme. But sometimes when people are passionate, they write and think sarcastically and it really describes what the reviewer was thinking and feeling well. Having said this, I do agree with that analogy. I also agree with her that the theologies presented in this book should be looked at carefully, and a Christian should not in any way think that they are facts. Our theologies should come clearly from the Bible. 
  I don't however agree about the writing style. A lot of the descriptions I found very poetic and picturesque. But also some of it was predictable which was disappointing. I could tell where he was going in some of his ideas. All in all, I wouldn't recommend the book for a new believer, but more for a person who has been walking with the Lord and who would know to always back whatever you hear on the Bible.