The Five Wishes of Mr. Murray McBride

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2018

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue-Chapter 9

Chapters 10-19

Chapters 20-29

Chapters 30-39

Chapters 40-49

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Background

Authorial Context: Joe Siple

Joe Siple is an American writer currently living in Fort Collins, Colorado. In his biography on his website, Siple describes working for 17 years on the manuscript of The Five Wishes of Mr. Murray McBride before landing a publication deal with Black Rose Writing. Siple has since published four other books: The Final Wish of Mr. Murray McBride, set in Jason’s adulthood; Charlie Fightmaster and the Search for Perfect Harmony, a story about a young professional baseball player with a troubled younger sister; The Town with No Roads, about a woman whose father falls into a coma; and The Last Dogs, about a near-future time where almost all dogs have been euthanized. His books all tackle stories meant to elicit strong emotional responses from readers and often address difficult subjects such as death, grief, and illness. Siple sees his writing as an opportunity to make the world a better place.

The Five Wishes of Mr. Murray McBride was a USA Today bestseller when it was first published in 2018. It has since won the National Indie Excellence Award and the PenCraft Award. It was named Book of the Year at the Maxy Awards in 2018. In 2024, Siple announced that The Five Wishes of Mr. Murray McBride had been optioned for adaptation into a feature film.

Genre Context: Inspirational Literature

Inspirational literature is intended to encourage readers to think more deeply about how to live a good life. The genre is broad, encompassing fiction, nonfiction, and self-help. Most inspirational literature, though not all, has a Christian message or is at least partially rooted in Christian (often Protestant) philosophy. Christian inspirational literature is often intended to tackle difficult questions about morality or suffering. It often contains themes and symbols that Christian readers will recognize and relate to. Writers such as Francine Rivers and Janette Oke are notable in this genre.

Christian inspirational literature contrasts with theological literature, where writers explore theological frameworks in a more abstract way. Writers of theological literature may allow readers to come to their own conclusions instead of directing them to a specifically Christian conclusion. Writers such as C. S. Lewis and Walter M. Miller Jr. are major figures in the genre of theological fiction. Other subgenres of inspirational literature include visionary fiction and gentle fiction. Visionary fiction is a New Age genre that typically explores themes of spirituality, mysticism, or parapsychology. Gentle fiction is a newer genre that purposefully contains no sex, violence, or profanity and aims to be heartwarming and thoughtful as it explores the everyday lives of ordinary people.

The Five Wishes of Mr. Murray McBride falls broadly into several of these subgenres, particularly Christian and theological fiction. Although Murray McBride is Catholic, his personal beliefs guide readers to a generally Christian conclusion, placing the book within the Christian fiction tradition. The book is also theological fiction; Murray’s difficulty understanding how God allows Jason’s suffering is a struggle of theodicy, which attempts to explain how a loving God can permit suffering and injustice. Murray also battles with religious doubts that are not fully resolved. The other characters are not explicitly religious; Jason does believe in heaven and, like Murray, grapples with theodicy. He struggles to understand why God allows children to die, and Murray has no answer for him.