Book excerpt: A college-level introduction that invites students into biblical studies through creative, humorous re-telling of the basic biblical narratives. The Bible is foreign territory for students encountering it in introductory classes. Even those who have spent many years in church have rarely read much of it. To most of us it looks like a big collection of rules, lists, and theological arguments. But in reality, most of the Bible is made up of stories. Sometimes they re inspiring, sometimes they re funny, sometimes they re weird, but they re never dull. The best way to get into the Bible, says Robert Darden, is to get to know its stories. In this new approach to introducing the Bible to students, Darden covers the major biblical stories and characters, retelling them in such a way as to bring out their original humor and pathos, and inviting the student to encounter them more fully by moving into the text itself.