Been in a non-fiction phase lately. I've been reading Bart Ehrman, a biblical scholar of some renown apparently, the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina. I'd bet that the group "Renowned biblical scholars" is pretty small and insular for the most part, but this guy's gone public with the fruits of his scholarship, about the origins of the biblical texts, how they've come down to us, what they originally said and meant (lot of additions and editorial changes in the days of hand-copying), stuff like that. Pretty interesting material, if you're curious about such things. He says in one of his books that this is the stuff they teach seminary students that you never hear about from the pulpit.
I had an English teacher in High School who used to say that those who are ignorant of the Bible are ignorant of English literature. It was 30 years before I understood what she meant, but I can see now that she was right. Funny what sticks in the mind; wish I could find her and tell her how important that lesson turned out to be. Titles I've got through so far: Misquoting Jesus, Lost Christianities, Lost Scriptures, and God's Problem. That last one is particularly interesting to me, it's much more personal than the others, and deals with how the Bible answers the question of why an omnipotent benevolent deity allows humans to suffer so. His answer surprised me.
