It’s a global phenomenon that seemed to materialize out of nowhere and the man at the helm says he’s really just along for the ride.
Paul Young, known on his book jacket as William Paul Young, is a father of six who sat down to write a book as a Christmas present for his kids. Five years later, he’s sold millions of copies, topped the New York Times Best Sellers’ list (from summer 2008 through 2010) and is considering paring down his speaking engagements to 50 this year, a drastic curb to his schedule.
“You write stuff for your friends and family and they’re all over it because they love you,” said Young. “It was a very big surprise that other people liked it too.”
Now writing a new book, one his wife of over 30 years, Kim, likes even more than The Shack, he’s turned the gift he developed on legal pads during his 40-minute bullet train commute, into a lifestyle.
The Shack, to catch those up to speed who haven’t read it, is a Christian-themed novel about a father of five who takes his children camping and finds he must rescue one child from drowning only to have another kidnapped and murdered while he does so. It’s a pretty dense plot and the book was never intended for print; and yet it’s created a new genre in evangelical Christian literature.
But the story of The Shack is only partly what’s contained within its pages.
The Christmas Young penned the text his family had nothing. He was literally scraping by on three jobs, his wife working at the high school bakery, when someone slipped an enveloped under their door anonymously with $100 it. The money allowed Young to print the first books as gifts and his friends and family soon started sharing them with others.
The story was such a hit it literally spread by work of mouth and, after 26 publishers turned it down, one man literally became a publisher by using his own credit cards in order to bring it to print.
Young never aspired to be a writer and says he doesn’t really think of himself as an author in the sense that one might see it as an identity. He enjoyed his job with a computer company and hotel very much and he enjoys being an author.
“If you put your identity into something, it’s bound to be taken away,” he said. “That’s just how it works.”
Young’s pearls of wisdom are brief. He tends to draw from his audience to figure out what to tell people when he talks and there’s never any shortage of material.
“The book affects people deeply,” he said. “The questions take us down very different paths, depending on what people are thinking about.”
Young’s family lives in the Okanagan.
His grandparents lived on Rose Avenue across from Kelowna General Hospital and his parents and sister are now in Vernon. As such, the Oregon-based author has spent a good deal of time here over the years, at one point even working at Vernon radio station CJIB, and always jumps at the opportunity to return.
As for the impact the book has had on his own life, he says the main difference is that he’s been able to give up his three jobs and write full-time.
The couple still live in their small house in Oregon and they’re still shocked at the course of their journey.
A German documentary is now being made about the making of the book and Young says the fortuitous connections The Shack manages to bring to his life still haven’t ceased. It turns out the videographer hired to shoot a segment of the movie at their home is the man who slipped the family the $100 used to print the book years before.
He had been looking for someone to help out and ended up speaking with a friend of Young’s. He slipped the money under the door and neither party met until they went to do the filming five years later.
Paul Young will be in Kelowna speaking at Botegga April 17 beginning at 7 p.m. The event is part of a three-part discussion series leading up to the Lille Gard Festival, put on by Tribehouse Artist Collective.
The discussion will focus on how Young has managed to weave his art and faith together. He will be preceded by jazz pianist Neville Bowman and singer/songwriter Joshua Smith. Tickets are $15.
jsmith@kelownacapnews.com
