1. Two outstanding, up-to-date books, both designed as a general introduction to the political history of the Restoration period, are: Paul Seaward, The Restoration, 1660–1688 (London, 1991);
2. and Tim Harris, Politics under the Later Stuarts (London, 1993). Neither makes any concessions to over-simplification, yet both are lucid and informative. Their interpretations differ a little in detail, but both emphasize the continuing importance of religion in politics in the period.
3. For the Restoration itself, R. Hutton, The Restoration: A Political and Religious History of England and Wales, 1658–1667 (Oxford, 1985) deals both with the processes by which the monarchy was restored and with the working out of the Restoration Settlement, and is very strong on the local dimension to national politics.
4. Paul Seaward, The Cavalier Parliament and the Reconstruction of the Old Regime, 1661–1667 (Cambridge, 1989)
5. has supplanted D. T. Witcombe, Charles II and the Cavalier House of Commons, 1663–1674 (Manchester, 1966), although the latter is still valuable for the period after 1667,