The Tank Man's Son by Mark Bouman

 "The Tank Man's Son" by Mark Bouman is a powerful book on the authors horrific childhood and how God used it for good.  This is the first book I have read in my life that had a warning about foul language from a Christian Publisher. This may make some stop and not read it but I know that if we are going to tell our story about life before Christ sometimes we have to use that language when showing what others have done and said to you otherwise I consider it a partial lie and you need to be truthful on how things were.  The author's childhood at points did seem like a kids dream (tanks, war games, and free outdoor play) but overall it was a child's nightmare growing up with an extremely abusive neo-nazi dad.   The physical abusive that the author went thru just broke my heart reading it but I did not stop reading as I could barely put the book down as I wanted to know how God was going to use this for His glory.  The author could have wrote the book in way that would tear his dad to shreds with words. But he didn't he wrote the facts in a way that showed his pain but also how every child does looks up to their father at some point even if its for a small amount of time.  He really showed us in words the confusion that went into his mind as a child and even that of his siblings.  Also his telling of his mom just made me respect her so much for her strength of what she had to endure and her finally saying enough.  But God used all of the nastiness for His glory.  Not only did the author come to know Jesus but he and his wife were able to be missionaries during one of  Cambodia's darkest times in history.  The violence and war life he got from his dad helped him during Cambodia's civil war.  But not only that we also read about the redemption and forgiveness of father and son.  It is a very powerful story and I plan on keeping this book to re-read or to give to someone who God leads me to that needs to read the story of this man.  I highly recommend this book please read it, we need to see how God can take the horrible things in our past and turn them to good for His glory.

I was given this book from Tyndale Publishers and was not required to give a positive review.