Oh,and we adored the Book of Tobit. Just because it was so damn weird. Not Revelations-weird, but pretty strange.
*Asimov’s Guide to the Bible *is very readable, at least to this atheist, but it is extremely outdated. Its approach was to consider the Bible as a history book, btw, and talk about the history and archeology available to flesh out the account. Since its publication Biblical Archeology has moved 'way ahead. Unfortunately I don’t know of any comparable but up-to-date book; I would be interested to find one.
I’ve been looking for exactly that book for years. Something like Asimov’s guide but completely updated with modern archaeological discoveries!
Someone has to have written something like this recently no?
To the OP: The Bible Unearthed might be a good introduction on what we know about the area, the peoples, and the times from an archaeological perspective. Would provide a nice context for your biblical studies. Contradictions, errors, myths, legends, etc start to make a lot of sense when you understand the motivations of the people, and the circumstances of the time when the Bible was being written.
As mentioned above, you want the New Revised Standard Version, ideally the new Oxford Annotated Version. It’s the same NRSV translation, but the footnoting is some of the best you can get. Very scholarly, it’s perfect for an academic or historical approach.
That said, one KJV and one NIV might be nice for the group to share. Sometimes the OAB can be a bit dry, and you might want a less-dry take on things at times.
A group of friends and I did a study of the first part of Exodus where everyone brought their own edition, and we compared translations. Of course, we also had a Hebrew version and people knowledgable in Hebrew, so that we could do that kind of comparison as well.
Just wanted to drop by and say thanks for all the suggestions, even if they are a bit late 
Had you not mentioned this, I wouldn’t have realized this tread was 5 years old! Proving that it’s still an interesting question, I guess.
So, how was the group. (Maybe this can be the Doper version of Stump the Chumps from CarTalk.)
BTW, I read Asimov’s Guide, and was disappointed. I sensed that he was trying way to hard not to be offensive to believers who picked up the book - not in the sense of actual insults to. religion, but in the sense of mentioning uncomfortable historical facts.