10 Summer Reads for the Intellectually Curious
Whether you're planning to do your summer research in the library or out in the field (i.e. on the beach), we hope you'll spend it with a good book – one from De Gruyter Brill! Find out what our team is reading on vacation this year and get 50% off all titles in our summer sale.
Summer is the season of stories – whether you’re basking in the sun with a monograph, savoring an edited collection by moonlight, or retreating to the cool refuge of a library. The longer days and warm evenings invite us to lose ourselves in a good book (or ten).
To help you make the most of your summer reading, De Gruyter Brill staff have curated a selection of top books that will both stimulate your mind and entertain your senses. Whether you’re looking for scholarly works to expand your knowledge or lighter reads for leisurely enjoyment, our recommended summer books have something for everyone.
Following the De Gruyter and Brill merger in March 2024, our teams from Leiden, Berlin and around the world have been getting to know each other. We’ve been working hard to bring you the first-ever De Gruyter Brill summer sale, with 50% off all our books until August 31st. But where to start? Let our staff’s recommendations guide you to your next great read. Happy reading!
Felix Torkar
JOVIS acquisitions editor Felix Torkar highly recommends Hey Computer! Icons of Architecture, Rebuilt by AI. In an artistic experiment, designer Floyd Erol Schulze fed descriptions of famous buildings into AI, which generated its own, oftentimes whimsical and far-out versions. Have a peek inside to see if you can recognize the original landmarks they’re based on.
Floyd went all out in pushing the artistic boundaries of generative AI in this unusual book. A perfect present for the design and architecture lover in your life, or anyone who needs reassurance that AI isn’t quite up to the job of replacing us yet.
Alexandra Koronkai-Kiss
Our next summer reading pick comes from De Gruyter editorial communications manager Sandra Koronkai-Kiss, who chooses Museums, Narratives, and Critical Histories: Narrating the Past for the Present and Future. She says: “I love this book, firstly because I used to work in museums and encountered many of the questions raised here, and because it presents such an exciting selection of institutions from around the globe, which the authors then use to dissect key issues. I think the subtitle is spot on, too – that’s exactly what a museum should do. A great read for anyone interested in storytelling and memory!”
Billy Sawyers
Asked for his summer reading tips, De Gruyter digital communications manager Billy Sawyers nominated Brill’s Best of Delectable Foods and Dishes from al-Andalus and al-Maghrib. He explains: “Nawal Nasrallah’s epic translation of a cookbook from 13th-century al-Andalus is making me long for more scholarly works that stimulate both intellect and appetite. This enormous book presents some beautiful illustrations alongside Ibn Razīn al-Tujībī’s 475 recipes – most of which sound pretty tasty, as well as being interesting historical documents. I’m looking forward to trying his aubergine omelette and following his advice for pickling lemons.”
Paul Gijsbers
Brill’s Paul Gijsbers also recommends a rare recipe book, the Treasure Trove of Benefits and Variety at the Table. This 14th-century cookbook covers a comprehensive and unique variety of contemporary Egyptian cuisine. It is the only surviving cookbook from a period when Cairo was a flourishing metropolis and a cultural haven for people of diverse ethnicities and nationalities. “It includes some marvelous recipes, some modern adaptations of classic recipes, including some very refreshing drinks for the summer,” says the team lead for content marketing at Brill.
Robert van Gameren
Did you know that Brill sometimes dips its toes into fiction? Our summer reading picks continue with Robert van Gameren, journals desk editor, who chooses Patricia Leavy’s novel Blue.
A former sociology professor turned writer, Patricia Leavy created the award-winning Social Fictions series at Brill, the first and only academic book series to solely publish full-length literary works. These novels, plays and short stories are underpinned by social research and are perfect for enhancing academic college curricula.
Blue follows three roommates as they navigate life and love in their post-college years. It’s about identity, friendship, figuring out who we are during the in-between phases of life, and the search for people who ‘get’ us. “It’s steeped in 80s pop culture,” says Robert, “so, if you’re into that, check out this book.”
Sophie Wagenhofer
Summertime is festival time. If you’re dancing along to anything electronic, this is the volume for you. Florian Völker’s Kälte-Pop explores performances of Teutonic coldness by the likes of Kraftwerk, Einstürzende Neubauten and other industrial favorites. Perfect for hot summer days, according to editorial director Sophie Wagenhofer!
What made ‘cold pop’ so cool? To find out, we interviewed the book’s author: Glorifizierung einer kalten Welt: Florian Völker im Interview über ‚Kälte-Pop‘.
Marcus Böhm
Literarische Organotechnik is part of the long-running De Gruyter series spectrum Literature / spectrum Literaturwissenschaft and the summer reading recommendation of De Gruyter acquisitions editor Marcus Böhm. This edited volume takes a step back from literature and literary studies to observe how these fields feed off other disciplines to obtain metaphors, models and figures of speech. Contemporary literary terms such as ‘rhizomes,’ ‘networks’ or ‘swarms’ are traced to their natural and/or technical origins from the Middle Ages to the present.
Mieke De Vries RobbÉ
Did you know that Brill’s legal counsel also moonlights as a sinologist? That would explain why Mieke de Vries Robbé chose Early Chinese Religion, Part One: Shang through Han as her summer reading pick. She elaborates: “The book deals with the period in which the basis was laid for traditional Chinese culture. Religion is often overlooked when dealing with this period and that’s a shame, I think. And that’s why this is my favorite summer read.”
Teddi Dols
Brill acquisitions editor Teddi Dols: “This summer, I am reading up on musk and the use of musk in perfume and in medicine in the Islamic World and beyond. Scent from the Garden of Paradise: Musk and the Medieval Islamic World, by Dr. Anya King. I’ve learned that Abbasid rulers perfumed their beards. And I’ve learned that Empress Josephine loved musk so much, her room still smelled of it sixty years after her passing.”
Julie Miess
Last but not least, De Gruyter’s Julie Miess recommends not just one book, but a whole series! American Frictions presents cutting-edge research in the field of American cultural studies – often available in open access – that enriches our understanding of difference, diversity and inequality, including gender, queer, decolonial, indigenous and critical race studies.
Pictured above in Berlin’s colorful Kreuzberg district, Julie shows off volumes 4, 5 and 7 of American Frictions, including Mariya Nikolova’s How Whiteness Claimed the Future, which will be published in paperback this autumn. Two monographs and two collections are still to come in 2024 – watch out for volumes on Afro-Latin soul music, reflecting ‘disability,’ life writing and New Hollywood.
Didn’t find what you were looking for? No problem! The summer sale works for almost any title published by De Gruyter Brill. Find your next summer read on the Brill, De Gruyter or Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht websites.
[Title Image by thomas-bethge/iStock/Getty Images]