I would actually call this three books, or at least one book, with a different book in the middle. I'm going to spoil it a little bit, so if you're interested in reading it, don't read this review.
The book starts with a narrator telling about a story he's going to tell. Then there's the first story - a guy takes his kids camping. It's a plodding story that eventually leads to tragedy - during a mishap involving two of his children, his third children is kidnapped by a serial killer. Let me back up - the family has this unique name for God that no one else uses and no one else outside his family knows about. With me? So then the guy gets this note inviting to the shack where his daughter was killed and it's signed by this unique name his family uses for God.
At this point, I'm screaming "Call the FBI! The killer probably heard the girl crying out to 'Papa' before he killed her. It's a trap!" But, this is Christian fiction, so this line of reasoning doesn't cross his mind. He determines to go, borrowing a car from someone else and also the gun that car-lender offers him. And then he travels to the shack. And that's where we end book 1. I don't recommend book 1. It plods along and the idea of a murdered child is not my idea of a good read.
And that's where we start book 2. The guy spends a long weekend with God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit who all inhabit corporeal human form for his comprehension. I think for God's first human form the author is thinking of The Oracle from The Matrix. I liked book 2. It dives into a lot of issues of God's relationship with humanity, why bad things happen, stuff like that. I found it to be quite thought-provoking, quite helpful in its examination of some of my own questions about my own relationship with God. I'd recommend book 2. It is a bit long and at times a little confusing, but I think it mostly works.
Eventually the weekend ends and book 1 resumes. It turns out the guy got into a car accident on his way to the shack and was in a coma all weekend long. Was his encounter with God a dream or did it actually happen during his altered conscience? And what about the note? Anyhow, he also, upon waking from the coma, is able to lead people to the cave where they find his daughter's remains and the sheet she's wrapped in provides enough clues that they then are able to identify and arrest the multi-state serial killer and find all of his past victim's bodies. This left a really bad taste in my mouth. It's a nice little bow to wrap everything up, to provide that final justice, to end on as high a note as you can when a six-year-old has been murdered, a bit of false hope that so many families who experience real pain don't get. It's too perfect. It's a cheat and a copout to try to make readers satisfied (if they don't stop to think about it for too long). So I don't recommend that either - well, plus I just explained it to you so now you can skip it. Oh, he also gets to see his daughter and to see his daughter interact with his other children, things that I don't think real parents get to experience after the loss of a child, at least not while they're still here on earth.
Still I do like the part in the middle. I think anyone can get a lot out of the meat, even if they don't eat the stale bread. It makes sense to have the dad be a grieving angry guy, but he's a bit one dimensional, mostly just someone for God (first a large black woman and later an older Native American man), Jesus (a middle-eastern carpenter) and Sarayu (the Holy Spirit as an Asian woman) to talk at. Oh, and a weird part involving a Judge who is like some weird honorary Trinity-adjacent something-or-other?
Book link takes you to Amazon. If you buy the book, Amazon might give me a penny.
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