Interviewing Wm. Paul Young.

Reading a book is like watching a movie, the difference is that in your imagination the resources are infinite, and the special effects are not limited to what technology can do, in a book, although you can't choose the script, you are responsible for all the details of the scenario. Great books gave rise to the Oscars winning films, and that's why Hollywoodeaqui.com wants to start 2013 encouraging the reading, and to brighten this article we have an exclusive interview with the author of the bestseller The Shack, William Paul Young, who fondly answered our request and granted us an interview to talk about his new book, Cross Roads. Check it out:

HEA: You consider your first book an "accident", you had no idea how great it would be, or how far it would reach. But when you wrote Cross Roads, you had something in mind? Which public you wanted to reach?

Wm.: I was with an aspiring writer a few evenings ago and asked her, "If your art, in this case writing, only touches one life, will that be enough?"  She thought before she answered and then said, "No, it won't be enough."  I told her, "Then you don't understand the value of the 'one', you would never leave the 99 to go find just the one (like Jesus would)."  She understood.

I don't write with an agenda trying to take people from one idea to another.  I would rather be in the creative activity of exploring a question or discovering and expanding creative space. Other people are able to hear for themselves.

HEA: All the dialogues in The Shack and Cross Roads are really touching, and full of wisdom, when you write as God, Jesus and Holy Spirit you consider as your own words or you think that you are a channel to transmit their words? 

Wm.: Instead of imagery and metaphor of channelling, I would much rather understand it as participation inside a relationship.  As human beings we are all growing and changing.  What you believe today will be considerably different in ten or twenty years, and yet you think you are completely right today.  I know that I am not.  I believe there is a God who not only invites participation but won't do many things without ours.  So we must assume that God is willing to participate with flawed and broken people.  After all, God participates with flawed people all the time in the creation of new human beings (conception) and then participates with them as they raise their children, and human beings make many mistakes as parents.  I don't write my books or raise my children by myself, but God does write them alone either...we participate together.  That is why life and creativity tends to be a mess, because you and I have been invited to participate.

HEA: Cross Roads was inspired in someone close of you? A relative, a friend? What was your inspiration to write this new book?

Wm.: Even though it is an 'accident' (not from God's point of view) that I have become a published author, I have always been a writer, especially for friends and family.  That won't change.  Inspiration is a community event.  No human being is an island to themselves.  Our histories together, our conversations, the music we listen to, the choices we make, how a rainbow touches us, our prayers, our ability to think about ideas...these are only a few of the influences that work together to inspire.

HEA: You visited Brazil in 2011 and had the chance to know your brazilian fans and openly talk about The Shack, do you have plans to come to Brazil this year to promote Cross Roads?

Wm.: I would love to come again, maybe this time with Baxter Kruger, the author of The Shack Revisited, who is a wonderful friend.  I loved both of my visits to Brazil and find Brazilians to among the kindest, spiritually sensitive and warmest people on the planet.  We will see.

HEA: And to finish, what you would like to say to all the brazilian teenagers, why they should read Cross Roads?

Wm.: I am not one to tell anyone they 'should' do anything.  Rather, I would invite you into the story and the conversation that it will raise both inside your own heart and also inside those in your community who have read the book.  Cross Roads is a story that explores and raises new questions.  I never set out with any sort of agenda such as 'life lessons'.  I would rather create space, or push out the walls of existing space and make room for others to hear within that landscape whatever it is that God might want to communicate.  Having said that, there are certainly themes in what I write, such as the value of each individual person, of a God who is good all the time regardless of our perception of the character and nature of that God, and that God is involved inside the details of our lives with great respect and affection independent of our ability to perform to religious creed or requirement. May we all become people who believe that life is bigger than death!

I've read The Shack and as Amber Sweeney said, "it's life changing." 

I'm currently reading Cross Roads and I'm speechless to compliment Wm. Paul Young,

the best I can do is to pray for God continue blessing his life. Thank you for reading. 

Se você é brasileiro pode ler a entrevista completa aqui: 
A Travessia – Exclusivo! William Paul Young e Sua Nova Obra

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It's a New Year, not "another" year.

Today has been a month since my last post, it's not like I don't have nothing good to share or too important to writing about. I had, actually I have. But sometimes we have to just enjoy the moment, appreciate the life, because it's short. In the last month our world faced a false alarm, an alarm that told us that this world that we live was about to ending. Maybe it didn't end to all the people, but to many people on this earth I am sure it did. Because our life is so fragile that we don't know what will be our last breath, if we are going to have the chance to say a last "I love you" or "Forgive me".

However, most of people on the earth received a new life, not because the Mayans say that this is a new cicle, but because it's a new year, you see the difference? We don't call it "another" year, we call it a "new" year for a reason, I am not so naive to believe that our problems just fade away of overnight. But if you receiving this new year as a new chance, a fresh start, you can finally face your problems from another point of view.
I decided to start my new year with a prayer, asking God not just to receiving blessing upon my life, but to I might be a blessing to as many lives as possible. I decided to change my goals, to pursue my dreams, but not forgeting who I am, and that doesn't need to change along the way. I decided not to complain about the struggles, but to get stronger after them.

And to finish, let me to share with you a little secret of myself: no matter how was your day always give thanks to God, and always start and finish your day saying: God I love you, Jesus I love you, Holy Ghost I love you. (they know that already, but just like you, they like to hear that sometimes).

P.S: Be ready! God loves to surprise us.

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