Books to read for the summer

The non-dissertation related ones, that is. These just arrived from Amazon.com (Baroque Cycle vol. 1, 2 and 3; Hayek). I expect to read them mostly while waiting for the laundry or when commuting:

On the first three, one reviewer has this to say:

OVER THE PAST YEAR OR SO, Neal Stephenson has produced a minor miracle: not one, but three bestselling nine-hundred-page novels, all focused on obscure topics of cryptography, monetary theory, and philosophy. Eschewing word processing, he wrote them with a fountain pen--in order, he said, to get himself into the mindset of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, the eras in which the books are set.

The three volumes are 927, 815 and 892 pages respectively--but the writer is right to offer the following retort. In his acknowledgements of various scholars on the period--17/18th century Europe and America--whose work made his own project possible (he finds himself emphasising that as the same scholars "may be chagrined by [his] own work's many excursions from historical truth", readers "who want to know what really happened should buy and read their books...") he mentioned "Sir Winston Spencer Churchill's six-volume biography of Marlborough, which people who are really interested in this period of history should read, and people who think that [he is] too-longwinded should weigh." Hear, Hear.

Anyway, I heard that it's very good. Really, a (fictional) trilogy that warrented its own wiki page had better be good.

Talking about Marlborough (1650-1722), the Duke's full name and title is: The Most Noble Captain-General John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, Earl of Marlborough, Baron Churchill of Sandridge, Lord Churchill of Eyemouth, KG, PC; Prince of Mindelheim; Prince of the Holy Roman Empire. Yes, Sir Winston is a descendant of the Duke--Winston's father was the third son of the 7th Duke of Marlborough.

I've seen the six-volumes before in NUS close stacks, but have never read more than a few chapters of the first volume. One of these days, one of these days...

The Hayek is another kettle of fish altogether--looks like there is a wiki page for it too, though much shorter. Let's just call it a continuing interest in the intersection of economic and political theory.