These are a series of short reads, just enough to get some flavor of what the philosopher was about. ( )

I’m a sucker for introductory books on philosophy, maybe in part because there are various approaches (historical, topical, etc.) and many fine minds with widely different views who’ve taken a variety of approaches to the basic formula chosen. This one’s pretty good. It gives synopses of the major ideas in two dozen books the author considers short-listers (covered in chronological order), with major counter-arguments. If anything it’s too concise, but the author knows his material and presents it very capably. A fault, in my view (though a very common one), is that he skips from late antiquity to Descartes (or Machiavelli in this case). It also seems a bit odd that he skips Hegel. On the other hand, about a third is given to the last 150 years, including Rawls, and the author’s convincing that this emphasis is warranted. ( )

A nice and comprehensible overview of a selection of classic works in philosophy. Not exhaustive, but it gives a nice summary of the selected works along with a summary of the criticism each work has drawn. I am just beginning to read about this subject, and I left this book with an idea of where I might want to read next. ( )

The author's selection of a "top 20" classics of philosophy is admittedly idiosyncratic. He omits, without apology, Husserl, Hegel and Heidegger so as to avoid recommending books that are "unecessarily obscure". Understandable, but then he includes Sartre while omitting Spinoza! Fortunately, the author redeems himself by including A.J.Ayer's work on Language, Truth and Logic, noting that many notable works fail to pass Ayer's Verification Principle--most are nonsense.
The template the author appears to use in introducing the 20 works is helpful -- He begins with the central idea/s of the philosopher, and elaborates the themes. Unfortunately, he misses the "voice", and the power of the originals. Fails to quote these Masters. He does, however, redeem himself by voicing the "criticisms", usually with illustrations. Each analysis contains a separate "Chronology", a "Glossary" which is topical, and a short (and idiosyncratic!) recommended "Further Reading" List. ( )