With this study of the Gospel of Mark, Brendan Byrne completes his trilogy of works on the Synoptic Gospels. Mark, the "Cinderella gospel," as Byrne says, languished for millennia in the shadow of Matthew ("the first gospel") and Luke. Beginning in the nineteenth century, scholars uncovered what is now generally accepted as the more likely scenario: that Mark was the pioneer, creating a new literary genre ("gospel") in which to communicate the "Good...