Forget AI oopsies; here are some of the best books to kick off your summer reading, from the steamy to the spine-chilling—and each hand-selected by the staff of VF.

My generation met him famous. His first novels he wrote as an undergraduate. One of them was the hugely popular ‘Weep Not, Child’; another was ‘The River Between.’ He was James Ngũgĩ, then he became ...