A Hijacking and The Reluctant Fundamentalist announce a new narrative order

Phil Hoad: Film has moved on from the non-linear jigsaws once used to depict our globalised state. Mira Nair's thriller dynamic and the subtlety found in Danish counterpart A Hijacking point the direction things are going

From Dante to Dan Brown: how artists have portrayed the Divine Comedy

Jonathan Jones: While Botticelli painted a mean Paradiso, Gustave Doré's dark drawings have been used to publicise Dan Brown's latest novel. We look at the art inspired by Dante's timeless text

The Serpent’s Promise: The Bible Retold as Science by Steve Jones – review

On our journey to understanding the origins of life and the cosmos, there is no wittier guide than geneticist Steve Jones, writes Robin McKie

How to Read a Graveyard by Peter Stanford – review

They set us off 'remembering, reflecting and puzzling'. But what do cemeteries reveal about our understanding of death? By Thomas Laqueur

A glimpse into Guantánamo Bay’s library

Nina Martyris: From the well-thumbed – Danielle Steele – to the untouched classics, pictures posted by US journalists show the reading matter permitted in the world's most controversial prison

The Serpent’s Promise: The Bible Retold as Science by Steve Jones – review

Steven Shapin on how the Bible and modern science tackle similar questions

The Story of My Purity by Francesco Pacifico – review

Either Pacifico's wit hasn't crossed over to English, or his book just isn't funny. Tibor Fischer is left cold

Silence: A Christian History by Diarmaid MacCulloch – review

Diarmaid MacCulloch considers the role of silence in church tradition and finds it not always a positive one, writes Richard Coles

Misery memoirs: why is it different for Muslim women?

Memoirs about the suffering of women in Islamic states are being slated for supporting a patronising attitude towards those societies. So why didn't the same criticism apply to Frank McCourt or Dave Peltzer, asks Samira Ahmed

The Invention of the Land of Israel by Shlomo Sand – review

In this second volume of his trilogy of Jewish studies, Sand explores how the "Land of Israel" was invented, and debunks popular nationalist mythology, writes Donald Sassoon

Historic psalm book could fetch $30m

One of only 11 surviving copies of Bay Psalm Book – the first tome printed in America in 1640 – is to be sold by Boston church

Poster poems: religion

Billy Mills: Whether you're believer, blasphemer or Buddhist – this month's commandment is to share with us your spiritual scribblings

Banished: Surviving My Years in the Westboro Baptist Church by Lauren Drain – review

This memoir allows us to get beyond the sense of incredulity that Westboro's hate-filled preaching inspires, exposing the internal logic and psychology of the church, writes David Shariatmadari

RS Thomas: Serial Obsessive by M Wynn Thomas – review

Rowan Williams discovers the man behind the myth in a superb collection of critical essays; a man as 'unignorable as a creaking door'

Silence: A Christian History by Diarmaid MacCulloch – review

Clerical abuse, the Holocaust … the church has often stayed silent. Stuart Kelly is impressed by a rich, robust study of Christian quietness