This text explains and analyzes the law of contract, and provides a detailed examination of many areas of controversy and difficulty. Amongst recent developments examined is the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Bill.

Background Elements: Contract Curve and Expectation Damages; Consideration and the Bargained-for Exchange; Contract Formation; Unfairness and Unconscionability; Contract Interpretation; Performance and Breach; Mistake and Impossibility; Remedies; Third-Party Beneficiaries.

Powell, John Joseph. Essay Upon the Law of Contracts and Agreements. Walpole: Printed, At the Press of Thomas & Thomas, by David Newhall, 1802. Two volumes. Reprint available January 2005 by the Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. ISBN 1-58477-520-3. Cloth. $150. * Reprint of the first American edition of the first treatise on the subject. (It is based on the first London edition, 1790, to which it is starred.) Powell [1755?-1801] wrote several distinguished treatises that were used widely in England and America, including this one. Though mildly critical of its organization, Holdsworth considers it "an able book" that "is much more than a digest of cases" because "[i]n all cases the author tries, with considerable success, to state principles, and to illustrate them by cases.": History of English Law XII:392.

Contracts: Cases and Theory has two principal ambitions: first, to present the basic doctrine of contracts in a comprehensive and coherent fashion; and second, to encourage a rigorous and interdisciplinary approach to thinking about the values and principles that inspire the law. The book provides a systematic survey of contract law while weaving in perspectives from economics, philosophy, sociology, and legal theory, to show how these disciplines can be used to both illuminate and criticize the law as it stands. The book's treatments of "law and" ideas are designed to be free-standing, making the book an excellent introduction to interdisciplinary legal thought for students without prior training in other fields.

Landmark Cases in the Law of Contract offers twelve original essays by leading contract scholars. As with the essays in the companion volume, Landmark Cases in the Law of Restitution (Hart, 2006) each essay takes as its focus a particular leading case, and analyses that case in its historical or theoretical context. The cases range from the early eighteenth- to the late twentieth-centuries, and deal with an array of contractual doctrines. Some of the essays call for their case to be stripped of its landmark status, whilst others argue that it has more to offer than we have previously appreciated. The particular historical context of these landmark cases, as revealed by the authors, often shows that our current assumptions about the case and what it stands for are either mistaken, or require radical modification. The book also explores several common themes which are fundamental to the development of the law of contract: for instance, the influence of commercial expectations, appeals to 'reason' and the significance of particular judicial ideologies and techniques.