Can such books be read...just for curiosity sake." This doesn't answer. Rambam wasn't a fan of it, but that doesn't mean its forbidden to read. Rassag may have borrowed from Islamic jurisprudence theory, but that still says nothing about reading Quran just for the sake of curiosity. So nothing in this answer addresses the OP's question. It should be a comment.

Just in case anybody ever had any doubts about the role that Mi Yodeya plays in making the world of online knowledge about Judaism a better place, here's a graph of recent traffic:

Many of us are here all the time, but those spikes show that we're here for people who have seasonal questions and need answers. (We also had bumps near Pesach.)

We also had spikes on the first day of Purim Torah and on erev Purim, but those might have slightly different causes.

(I've no idea what the spike on August 25 was about.)

@MonicaCellio Awesome!!

@mevaqesh it makes me feel really good that when people have those last-minute questions heading into Yom Kippur, they're coming here.