Introductions

Steve Hagen, Buddhism Plain and Simple (London: Penguin, 1999)

Ethics: how should Buddhists behave?

Damien Keown, Buddhist Ethics: a Very Short Introduction (OUP 2005) - available online at veryshortintroductions.com.

Extension

Rupert Gethin The Foundations of Buddhism (Opus, 1998)

Richard Gombrich, Theravada Buddhism: A Social History from Ancient Benares to Modern Colombo, 2nd Edition (London: Routledge, 1998)

Richard Gombrich, How Buddhism Began, 2nd Edition (London: Routledge, 2008)