I've even raped and killed a mountain panda in the hills of Shaanxi.

Somehow the library system fucked up its hold list and let me check out God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. I blazed through it in one night and am currently reading it more leisurely, for such gems as this:

Actually the "leap of faith" - to give it the memorable name that Kierkegaard bestowed upon it - is an imposture. As he himself pointed out, it is not a "leap" that can be made once and for all. It is a leap that has to go on and on being performed, in spite of mounting evidence to the contrary. This effort is actually too much for the human mind, and leads to delusions and manias... Now that religion's monopoly has been broken, it is within the compass of any human being to see these evidences and proofs* as the feeble-minded inventions they are.

Also of course the chapter "Why Heaven Hates Ham."

* including arguments from design, revelations, punishments, and miracles.

Nonfiction first.

Ruth Reichl, Tender at the Bone

Her memoir was like a female straight David Sedaris who cooks instead of smokes. Well ok not quite that funny but pretty close. Plus, you know, recipes.

Howard Bloom, The Lucifer Principle

Psychology and sociology of "evil," hierarchies, and how power corrupts.

Julian Jaynes, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind
Terrence McKenna, Food of the Gods
Elaine Morgan, The Descent of Women

These three books are basically about evolution. The first two posit different theories about religion and the origin of consciousness, and the latter introduces the "aquatic ape" theory.

Walter F Otto, The Homeric Gods
Elizabeth Wayland Barber, When They Severed Earth from Sky

Two books that try to make sense of myths. The former puts Greek myth/religion into context, the latter shows that myths are most likely a coded form of oral history.

Abducted is a pretty short nonfiction book, in which the author ties together disparate threads to explain why/how people come to believe they were abducted by aliens. I'm always curious as to why people believe weird things - as opposed to knowing the weird things they believe, which tends to be horribly boring unless tied together by Shea and Wilson - because it's so utterly understandable yet confusing at the same time. That is to say, I can see where it starts, but I don't get why people continue in the face of other evidence.

But I'm kind of excessively logical that way. And part of the problem is that there's no way to prove that these people weren't actually abducted. Basically it comes down to having sleep paralysis and being fantasy-prone, although there's a bit more to it than that. The interesting part is that most of these people aren't nuts or anything like that, they just have a really weird belief. Although is this belief any weirder than the Jesus thing? At this point in time, yes, but only because it's less common.

GOD DOESN'T WANT YOU TO WEAR PANTS

although my favorite bit is this quote from Axl Rose:
It's not easy to be in a one-on-one relationship if the other person is not going to allow me to be with other people.

edit:

Heathen home-wrecking whores like the godless Britney Spears are the ones directly responsible for generating lasciviousness across America and the world.  Like sewage oozing from the septic tank, evil doers like Britney Spears, Jessica Simpson, and Jennifer Lopez are destroying families worldwide.  The devil is so proud of them, but God is very angry (Psalm 7:11).  Lasciviousness in the Bible is defined as "An unhealthy sexual appetite, an unstable mind."  In other words, scum like Britney Spears causes men to want to go commit horrible sins and crimes (and they are).  Little girls are being abducted, raped and some killed because men are going crazy.  Britney Spears is a monster in sheep's clothing.  These women are using their beauty to inspire men to commit sexual sins and crimes.  Society can argue that because most men don't commit such crimes that people like Britney Spears cannot be blamed.  However, that is simply not true.  Britney Spears is guilty, just as are ALL of the entertainment industries lewd and sensual performers.

"The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."- Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

That guy who totally wants to be David Bowie, Brandon Flowers of the Killers, is a lousy stinking Mormon.