The Architecture of the Eighteenth Century by John Summerson

This is a very nice, comprehensive, concise yet detailed survey of exactly what it says on the tin. And despite the rather boring title, I found it very interesting and helpful in understanding a lot of distinctions between various architectural movement and expressions. The illustrations (which are unfortunately all black and white) are very helpful and well-chosen. It's a bit didactic and gets a little jargon-heavy sometimes (I spent a bit more time than I would have liked looking up specific architectural terms), but is for the most part highly accessible and is only mildly theoretical (honestly I would have liked a bit more analysis). The examples get a bit tedious in their descriptions, but it's easy to just skim them and move on to the relevant parts. A better title for this book would probably be 'How English Architecture Is the Apex of all Architectural Movements in the Eighteenth Century (Okay France Did Some Shit Too)', but that's a bit long. Summerson tends to rush through any country that is not England and France (and sometimes Germany), such as a very reluctant section on Spain, Portugal, and Latin America, but that's okay with me, because I actually did only want to read about English architecture. Anyways, very informative and helpful overall.