Shack (Young)

Author Bio 
• Birth—May 11, 1955
• Where—Grande Praire, Alberta, Canada
• Reared—West Paupua
• Education—B.A., Warner Pacific College
• Currently—lives in Gresham, Oregon, USA

William P. Young was born a Canadian and raised among a Stone Age tribe by his missionary parents in the highlands of former New Guinea. He suffered great loss as a child and young adult and now enjoys the "wastefulness of grace" with his family in the Pacific Northwest. (From the publisher.)

More
William P. Young is an American author, best known for The Shack, a Christian novel. Young initially printed just fifteen copies of his book for friends who encouraged him to have it published. Unable to find a publisher, Young published the book himself in 2007; word-of-mouth referrals eventually drove the book to number one on the New York Times trade paperback fiction best-seller list in June 2008.

In an interview with World Magazine's Susan Olasky, Young, who is no longer a member of a church, said that the institutional church...

doesn't work for those of us who are hurt and those of us who are damaged.... If God is a loving God and there's grace in this world and it doesn't work for those of us who didn't get dealt a very good hand in the deck, then why are we doing this?... Legalism within Christian or religious circles doesn't work very well for people who are good at it. And I wasn't very good at it.

An article in MacLean's Magazine in August 2008 indicated that Young, is a...

Canadian raised from birth by his missionary parents in Dutch New Guinea, Young was sexually abused by some of the people his parents preached to, as he was again back home, at a Christian boarding school. Young drifted through life as an adult, buoyed a little by his faith and a lot by his wife, Kim, keeping his secrets and building his shack: "the place we make to hide all our crap," he calls it. Until, at 38, he found himself at the nadir. "I had a three-month affair with one of my wife's best friends. That was it, that just blew my careful little religious world apart. I either had to get on my knees and deal with my wife's pain and anger or kill myself.

Young currently resides in Gresham, Oregon, with his wife and six children. (From Wikipedia.)