Academic Thrillers: The formulaic plot of Gospel Thrillers, with their personal, political, and theological anxieties, occasionally bursts into the real world when new discoveries (real or forged) generate anxiety within, and outside of, academic biblical studies. That the fictional and real-world narratives in such cases as the Secret Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Judas, and Gospel of Jesus’s Wife mirror so closely the overblown world of Gospel Thrillers shows how deeply these fears and anxieties penetrate into cultural and political consciousness.