Christian Retailing

'The Shack' follow-up coming, 'Love Languages' reaches milestone Print Email
Written by Eric Tiansay   
Friday, 25 May 2012 12:00 AM America/New_York

William P. Young's follow-up to his Christian publishing sensation, The Shack (Windblown Media/Hachette Book Group USA), will be released in the fall. Meanwhile, Gary Chapman's best-selling The 5 Love Languages (Northfield Publishing/Moody Publishers) has reached another milestone.

Young's Cross Roads will be published in hardcover by Hachette's FaithWords imprint Nov. 13. Audio, e-book and foreign editions are also planned.

"In the tradition of The Shack, Paul Young has written a wonderfully creative and provocative story that will certainly stir imaginations and hearts," said Rolf Zettersten, Hachette's senior vice president and publisher. "It entrenches Paul's reputation as a major novelist of our time."

In Cross Roads, Young tells the story of a driven man who falls into a coma and experiences relational entanglements, which causes him to revisit choices he made during his life.

Windblown Media originally published The Shack in 2007 with a first printing of 10,000 copies. Sales grew steadily by word-of-mouth that year, and by spring 2008, Windblown had sold more than a million copies on just $200 of marketing. In May 2008, Windblown entered into an arrangement with Hachette to distribute The Shack to meet the demand.

The novel has more than 18 million copies in print. This fall, FaithWords will also publish a devotional, The Shack: Reflections for Every Day of the Year, based on the book.

Chapman's The 5 Love Languages has sold more than 7 million copies since its 1997 publication, according to Moody Publishers. More than 2 million people have gone online to take The 5 Love Languages free assessment to help them discover their own love language in order to strengthen their relationships.

"I'm thrilled that millions of people are willing to do what takes to stay together," said Chapman, a New York Times best-selling author. "So many times we hear of people giving up. Something seems broken, but they don't know where to start to fix it. They say things like, 'We just grew apart.' But this gives me tremendous hope. If given the tools, millions of people are able to discover their own as well as their loved one's primary love language and then act on it. This is truly an answered prayer."