The books Spectator readers take on their summer holidays

Recently, Spectator writers shared their all-time favourite summer holiday reads. In response, Spectator readers have been offering their own recommendations for what books to take to the beach…

‘You might try Helen Thompson’s Disorder: Hard Times in the 21st Century, a history of oil politics. It starts with the simple fact that in evolving from the steam to petroleum age, the old western powers no longer had direct access to fuel and faced a growing dependency on oil from Russia, initially, and then the Middle East. The US, of course, is an exception as it has domestic resources – but foreign policy errors led to it being the guarantor of petroleum resources to the rest of Nato. When they couldn’t deliver, Germany, among others, turned to the Soviet Union – and the Soviet Union turned into Russia… which brings us up to date. Great read.’