 | The Puritan Experiment: New England Society from Bradford to Edwards (Library of New England) by Francis J. Bremer
Buy new: $23.35 / Used from: $13.18 This is a very fine overview of the history of Puritanism in America from its origins to the Great Awakening. Consider it a textbook and use it as such.
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 | The New England Mind: The Seventeenth Century by Perry Miller
Buy new: $29.49 / Used from: $12.81 Perry Miller's classic study of the thought of American Puritans remains an important work. This is only the first volume, but prepare for turgid prose. Click on the book for my more extensive review.
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 | The New England Mind: From Colony to Province by Perry Miller
Buy new: $28.35 / Used from: $4.99 The second volume of Perry Miller's classic study, carrying the story into the Revolutionary era. Click on the book for my more extensive review.
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 | Errand into the Wilderness by Perry Miller
Buy new: $20.72 / Used from: $5.00 If you cannot bring yourself to slog through "The New England Mind" this is a fine introduction to the reasons for the Puritan migration to America. Click on the book for my more extensive review.
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 | The Puritans: A Sourcebook of Their Writings
Buy used from: $8.00 Perry Miller and Thomas Johnson assembled this valuable collection of primary documents on a range of subjects written by Puritans.
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 | Puritans in the New World: A Critical Anthology
Buy new: $28.95 / Used from: $7.00 A very fine anthology of Puritan writings edited by Harvard historian David D. Hall, emphasizing their worldviews, their spirituality, and their place in the development of American culture.
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 | Visible Saints: The History of a Puritan Idea by Edmund S. Morgan
Buy new: $17.05 / Used from: $4.49 What made a Puritan a Puritan? The great colonial historian Edmund S. Morgan answers that question in this classic study in intellectual history.
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 | Of Plymouth Plantation by William Bradford
Buy new: $24.00 / Used from: $20.00 William Bradford, the leader of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Plantation, wrote this important history of the settlement.
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 | The Puritan Dilemma: The Story of John Winthrop (2nd Edition) by Edmund S. Morgan
Buy new: $16.67 / Used from: $0.01 This is a classic biography of the governor the Massachusetts Bay Colony. It is must reading for anyone seeking to understand the Puritan "errand into the wilderness."
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 | Liberty of Conscience: Roger Williams in America by Edwin S. Gaustad
Buy new: $14.04 / Used from: $7.87 The father of the American idea of the separation of church and state, this is a fascinating portrait of one of the most important thinkers among the Puritans; exiled from Mass. by John Winthrop.
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 | American Jezebel: The Uncommon Life of Anne Hutchinson, the Woman Who Defied the Puritans by Eve LaPlante
Buy new: $10.76 / Used from: $3.98 Anne Hutchinson came to the Massachussetts Bay colony in 1634 wanting to live a saintly life in a new world free from the sins of the old. She quickly ran afoul of John Winthrop for leading a study group that quickly challenged the authority of the clerics. For that she was banished to Rhode Island in 1637. This is an excellent work on this uncommon woman's life.
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 | The Puritan Family: Religion & Domestic Relations in 17th Century New England by Edmund S. Morgan
Buy new: $13.95 / Used from: $0.01 Do you agree that H.L. Mencken was right that Puritans had the unabiding fear that somewhere, someone might be happy? This book, written in a lively style, will dispell that myth.
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 | New England's Generation: The Great Migration and the Formation of Society and Culture in the Seventeenth Century by Virginia DeJohn Anderson
Buy new: $23.76 / Used from: $8.89 Surveying the migration of Puritans from England to North America, this study focuses on motives for coming to America, the Atlantic crossing, patterns of Puritan settlement, and goals for a new life.
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 | The Long Argument: English Puritanism and the Shaping of New England Culture, 1570-1700 (Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture) by Stephen Foster
Buy new: $26.50 / Used from: $10.89 A significant analysis of the place of Puritianism in the delineation of the American character.
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 | The New England Soul: Preaching and Religious Culture in Colonial New England by Harry S. Stout
Buy new: $60.00 / Used from: $17.96 The author offers a close reading of the sermons of the New England divines, analyzing how over five generations these preachers taught the concept of a convenant people with a unique relationship to God.
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 | Worlds of Wonder, Days of Judgment: Popular Religious Belief in Early New England by David D. Hall
Buy new: $23.67 / Used from: $11.13 An excellent discussion of how colonial Puritans, and others, approached their lives in the context of their religion.
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 | Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War by Nathaniel Philbrick
Buy new: $19.77 / Used from: $0.69 A fine, modern history of the Pilgrim experience in coming to America.
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 | A New England Town : The First Hundred Years : Dedham, Massachusetts, 1636-1736 (Norton Essays in American History) by Kenneth A. Lockridge
Buy new: $16.67 / Used from: $0.15 An outstanding demographic study of Dedham, Massachusetts, and the origins of democracy in it. Click on the book for my more extensive review.
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 | A Little Commonwealth: Family Life in Plymouth Colony by John Demos
Buy new: $17.99 / Used from: $4.50 A superb example of the "New Social History," John Demos explores the lifestyles of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Colony. Click on the book for my more extensive review.
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 | From Puritan to Yankee: Character and the Social Order in Connecticut, 1690-1765 (Center for the Study of the History of Liberty in America) by Richard L. Bushman
Buy new: $28.00 / Used from: $1.40 Another outstanding "New Social History" of colonial New England, Richard Bushman explores the transition from Puritanism to revolution in Connecticut.
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 | Creating the Commonwealth: The Economic Culture of Puritan New England by Stephen Innes
Buy new: $18.25 / Used from: $1.27 An Important study of the economics of Puritan New England.
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 | Good Wives: Image and Reality in the Lives of Women in Northern New England, 1650-1750 by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
Buy new: $10.17 / Used from: $2.40 A superb study of the lives of early American women in New England, written by Pulitzer Prize winning historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich.
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 | Changes in the Land, Revised Edition: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England by William Cronon
Buy new: $13.08 / Used from: $5.00 Written by environmental historian William Cronon, this study explores the manner in which Puritans and Native Americans altered the landscape of New England during the colonial era.
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 | The Devil in Massachusetts: A Modern Enquiry into the Salem Witch Trials by Marion L. Starkey
Buy new: $11.21 / Used from: $0.01 A classic narrative of the witch hunt in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692. There has been many excellent books published on this subject since Starkey's book first appeared, but none equalt it as a great literary experience.
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 | The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England by Carol F. Karlsen
Buy new: $11.53 / Used from: $2.87 Broader than just the Salem withcraft trials, this book explores the history of gender relations in the context of those accused of witchcraft.
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 | Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England by John Putnam Demos
Buy new: $18.99 / Used from: $6.58 There have been many books on the Salem witchcraft trials of 1692, but this is one of the best.
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 | Judge Sewall's Apology : The Salem Witch Trials and the Forming of an American Conscience by Richard Francis
Buy used from: $3.54 Using the biography of Samuel Sewall (16521730) the author explores the declension of Puritan New England in the first part of the eighteenth century.
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 | Escaping Salem: The Other Witch Hunt of 1692 (New Narratives in American History) by Richard Godbeer
Buy new: $15.44 / Used from: $7.12 Explores the witchcraft trials in Connecticut taking place near the same time as those in Salem. In contrast to Salem, the trials in Connecticut ended without bloodshed. The author opens a broader window of analysis, overturning the stereotype of New Englanders as judgmental and violent.
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 | New England Frontier: Puritans and Indians 1620-1675 by Alden T. Vaughan
Buy new: $21.02 / Used from: $15.56 An outstanding history of the interactions of Puritans and Native Americans in New England.
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 | Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America by Edmund S. Morgan
Buy new: $11.96 / Used from: $2.87 This is an important work on the rise of representative democracy in the British Empire, focusing on the antecedents in England and their transmission to North America.
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 | The Mathers: Three Generations of Puritan Intellectuals, 1596-1728 by Robert Middlekauff
Buy new: $21.95 / Used from: $7.83 A group biography of one of the most important families of Puritan New England. The most famous, Cotton Mather, was involved in the Salem witchcraft trials.
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 | Jonathan Edwards: A Life by Professor George M. Marsden
Buy new: $14.96 / Used from: $9.95 Winner of the Bancroft Prize, this is a superb biography of the intellectual leader of the "Great Awakening," best known for his sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Engry God."
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 | The Puritan Origins of the American Self by Sacvan Bercovitch
Buy new: $18.93 / Used from: $11.59 An engaging and seminal study of the place of Puritanism in the creation of the American character. Click on the book for my more extensive review.
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 | The Protestant Interest: New England After Puritanism by Professor Thomas S. Kidd
Buy new: $45.00 / Used from: $27.99 Investigates the history of New England as Puritanism was supplanted by revivalist Christian ideology.
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