Respectful, Waiting, Recycling, Weaving: A Review of Cross Roads by Wm Paul Young

Disclosure: I received this book free in exchange for agreeing to write a review for Speakeasy. 

Wm Paul Young, the self-published author of the megahit The Shack has written another novel, this time with the help of Faith Words publishers, who released Cross Roads last month. Once again, Young writes of an encounter between a broken human being and the three members of the Trinity, depicted in his characteristically earthy, accessible and (in my opinion) winsome way. This book reminded me in turns of The Shack, A Christmas Carol (Dickens), The Great Divorce (Lewis), and Pilgrim’s Progress (Bunyan).

To get my biggest criticism out of the way, I’ll just say that the first thirty-some pages turned me off completely. If I hadn’t been committed to reading the entire thing and writing a review as part of my agreement with Speakeasy, as well as having liked The Shack well enough to press on in faith that Young's storytelling abilities would win out, I would’ve abandoned the effort. The first few chapters are meant to introduce the reader to the deplorable state of the main character, Tony’s, life, but do so by a string of preachy commentary and psychoanalytical insights that leave no doubt that we’re being set up for a redemption story.

After his rough beginning, however, Young does what he does so well and draws the reader in by telling good stories and writing great dialogue that develop each character in a meaningful, fleshed-out way that feels natural and engaging. Finally, I began to care about the main character. Tony is a successful businessman, too self-absorbed and too busy to really care about or even notice the trail of broken relationships he’s left in the wake of his path to the top.

After a medical situation (you can read the fifteen paragraphs of technical medical lingo yourself if you want the details) which leaves him in a coma and near death, he wakes up to find himself in what is later described as the “in-between place” that separates the “life-before” from the “life-after.” The characters he meets in this place have different roles to play on his path to self-discovery and redemption. The main characters here are Jesus-in-blue-jeans and Grandmother, who represents the Holy Spirit as a feisty elderly Native American woman.

Part of Tony’s journey involves “sliding” into the minds of several people in the life-before, most notably a 15-year-old boy with Down Syndrome named Cabby and a feisty African American woman named Molly. These perspectives allow Tony the opportunity to experience the world outside himself by “walking a mile in another’s shoes,” as it were. Here, Young’s storytelling and character development are wonderful. I fell in love with Cabby almost instantly as I, too, got to experience a perspective outside my own. I had a few good laughs when Maggie was convinced she had a demon because Tony spoke inside her mind to prevent an awkward situation.

The back of the book sets up the premise of the story: God gives Tony the chance to choose for one person to be healed: will it be himself, or someone else? His time inside the minds of four or five people in the present time (the life-before), interspersed with his conversations with Jesus and Grandmother and a few other surprising characters in the in-between help him to make his choice, which wasn’t quite as predictable as I’d thought it might be.

Several things have stuck with me since reading Cross Roads. I was intrigued by Young’s repeated theme of God as one who respects relationship, who is willing to wait for his creation to make room for him in their lives. “While he is never absent, he also waits for you in the forest, outside the walls of your heart,” says Grandmother to Tony. “He is not one who forces relationship. He is too respectful.” (80)

Through Jack, a companion of Tony’s in the life in-between, Young pictures God as a great recycler, through whom nothing is wasted: “God wastes nothing, not even the wrong we have imagined into existence. In every building torn down there is much that remains that was once true and right and good, and that gets woven into the new; in fact, the new could not be what it is without the old. It is the refurbishing of the soul.” (159)

Lastly, and my favourite, was the way Young characterised the Holy Spirit. Grandmother, Young’s image of the Spirit, describes herself this way: “‘I am she who is more than you can begin to imagine and yet anchors your deepest longings. I am she whose love for you, you are not powerful enough to change, and I am she whom you can trust…I am a fire and fury opposed to everything that you believe that is not the Truth, that is hurting you and keeping you from being free. I am the Weaver, you are a favorite color, and he,’ – she tilted her head toward Jesus – ‘he is the tapestry.’” (93)

Respectful, waiting, recycling, weaving. As with The Shack, I’m sure some will take issue with the ways that Young has chosen to represent the members of the Trinity. And my response is the same as it was with The Shack: you don’t have to agree to be challenged in your own understanding of what God is like, and to grow from the experience. The man is not writing a theology textbook or attempting to rewrite the Bible. He’s using his God-given imagination to explore his own understanding of God and our interactions with him, and overall I was quite pleased with the effort.

~Becky

Check out the brand-new trailer here and the archived Cross Roads interview here.

Check out these links to find out more about Wm Paul Young:
Paul's website
Paul's old blog
Paul on Facebook
Paul on Twitter
Crossroads chat on Amazon