Benedict, Philip, and Myron P. Gutmann, eds. Early Modern Europe: From Crisis to Stability. 2005. A helpful introduction to the many facets of the seventeenth-century crisis.

Burke, Peter. The Fabrication of Louis XIV. 1992. Explains the use of architecture, art, medals, and other symbols to promote the king’s image.

Elliott, John H. Imperial Spain, 1469–1716, 2d ed. 2002. An authoritative account of Spain’s rise to imperial greatness and its slow decline.

Gaunt, Peter, ed. The English Civil War: The Essential Readings. 2000. A collection showcasing leading historians’ interpretations of the Civil War.

Hughes, Lindsey, ed. Peter the Great and the West: New Perspectives. 2001. Essays by leading scholars on the reign of Peter the Great and his opening of Russia to the West.

Ingrao, Charles W. The Habsburg Monarchy, 1618–1815, 2d ed. 2000. An excellent synthesis of the political and social development of the Habsburg empire in the early modern period.

Mungello, D. E. The Great Encounter of China and the West, 1500–1800, 2d ed. 2005. An introduction to China’s relations with the West in the early modern period, encompassing politics, religion, science, culture, and the arts.

Parker, Charles. Global Interactions in the Early Modern Age, 1400–1800. 2010. A fascinating and accessible account of the global interaction of states, peoples, cultures, and goods in the early modern period.

Romaniello, Matthew. The Elusive Empire: Kazan and the Creation of Russia, 1552–1671. 2012. A study of the conquest of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible in 1552 and the Russian empire built in its aftermath.

Schama, Simon. The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age. 1987. A lengthy but vivid and highly readable account of Dutch culture in the seventeenth century, including a chapter on the mania for speculation on the tulip market.

Stern, Philip J. The Company-State: Corporate Sovereignty and the Early Modern Foundations of the British Empire in India. 2011. A study of the British East India Company and its role in governing India.