• 'The evolution of God' offers skeptical view of religion

In a recent New York Times review of Robert Wright's new book "The Evolution of God," the critic quips: "There is something here to annoy almost everyone."Which explains why a religion writer would find the book so compelling. There's nothing worse for a journalist trying to gain a better understanding of religion than to read a sugar-coated monument to a faith. Sugar-coated Wright's tome is not. He takes a decidedly skeptical view of religion as he recounts some of humankind's earliest concepts of God, the emergence of monotheism among the ancient Israelites (which ultimately became Judaism) and the development of the world's largest religions today: Christianity and Islam.