Saved by the Light: The True Story of a Man Who Died Twice and the Profound Revelations He Received

by Dannion Brinkley with Paul Perry
 
Dannion Brinkley has the most detailed Near Death Experience of any Dr. Raymond Moody has ever encountered, and to top it off, he has had two such experiences - the first after being struck by lightning and the second during open heart surgery. His story is both compelling and incomprehensible. If anything the book further convinced me that we are only minutely aware of the bigger picture.

Waking Up to the Dark: Ancient Wisdom for a Sleepless Age

by Clark Strand
 
I quite enjoyed the first half of this book where Strand explores the research around the shifting pattern of sleep from ancient times until our modern age, and how electric light particularly has removed the natural sleep pattern of earlier generations. The natural pattern has sleep divided into two parts with an "hour of God" in the middle of the night. I was less convinced of his personification of darkness as a woman, and more specifically with the black Madonna. Still, some good food for thought about our disconnect from nature and its spiritual cost.

Inventing Hell: Dante, the Bible and Eternal Torment

by Jon Sweeney
 
In a manner that is quite accessible yet still academic Sweeney gives an overview of Dante's Inferno and more importantly the sources Dante drew on to develop his famous work. I was surprised to learn how much Greek mythology was woven into Inferno, and also how the Quran might also have been a source. It is important to understand what Dante was intending with his epic poem because much of western civilization's understanding of Hell has been shaped by Dante's work. Our western culture's image of Hell, which we might assume to be scriptural, is more the result of a early medieval work of fiction.