What book(s) would you recommend to an intelligent person with little or no knowledge of alchemy to give them a general idea of the subject?

Aloys Wienner von Sonnenfels.
Splendor lucis, oder Glantz des Lichts. Eine kurze physico-cabalistische Auslegung des grösten Natur-Geheimnusses, insgemein Lapis Philosophorum gennant.
Vienna, 1745

Or Glory of Light, containing a brief physico-cabalistic interpretation of the greatest mystery of Nature, called the lapis philosophorum. From the basic Hebrew text of the Holy Scriptures, printed in the Hebrew and German languages and published by Aloysio Wienner.


   

From Pepper's Playbook of Metals 1861

https://archive.org/search?query=%22play...+metals%22

   

Sienna Latham.

A thesis submitted to the Victoria University of Wellington in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History

This thesis explores the advent of gentlewomen's chymical activities in Elizabethan England. In the sixteenth century, chymistry gained widespread currency under Queen Elizabeth I. This thesis argues that the queen's significant chymical interests contributed to her iconography, thereby bridging England's previously discrete chymical and female realms.

https://www.academia.edu/1113746/_Lady_A..._Chymistry

Giovanni Aurelio Augurello.
Vellus aureum et chrysopoeia, seu chrysopoeia major et minor, das ist, Gülden-Vliess und Gold-erzielungs-Kungst.
Hamburg, 1716.

A phoenix sits on a bed of flaming coals, smoke and flames coming from its mouth.
On its tail is depicted a figure surrounded by books. 
A naked soul-form (Sophia?) with winged heels rises up towards a Zeus-like figure with thunderbolts, who stands above the clouds beside the sun in a radiant nimbus of light.


Das endt ist gleich den Ursprungs Grunden
Das kan der Frey-Geist hie nicht finden.

Diss Reist bladt zeiget an
Wast die Sophia kan

Ich Phoenix bin, und bleibe aschen;
Dar feur wird mich nicht anders waschen.


   

Willard.

Thomas Vaughan lived in three physical words: in rural Wales, in Oxford, and in the greater London area. He also inhabited three philosophical worlds: the natural world, the celestial or spiritual world, and the super-celestial or angelical world. This paper was read in Brecon Cathedral at the 400th anniversary of the births of the twin brothers Henry and Thomas Vaughan.

https://www.academia.edu/97760249/Three_...as_Vaughan

I found this interesting alchemical engraving in  Geheimnisse einiger Philosophen und Adepten, aus der Verlassenschaft eines alten Mannes. Leipzig, 1780,

The text below states:-

Est lapis occultus, in imo fonte sepultus, Vilis et ejectus, fimo et stercore tectus
It is a hidden stone, buried in the bottom of the fountain, base and cast out, covered with filth and dung.


   

By Alister McGrath.

It has been noted that the exploration of alchemical themes during the Renaissance and early modern period often took a poetic form. This article sets out to explore this in greater detail, especially in the light of a deeper understanding of the persistent creative intermingling of alchemical and theological imagery during the early modern period arising from recent scholarship, particularly the imaginative lure of the notion of chrysopoeia ("turning into gold") for many Renaissance writers.

https://www.scilit.net/article/bec27ef0e...references

Irene Zenon, PhD thesis, University of Venice.

309 pages, nicely illustrated, in English.

http://dspace.unive.it/bitstream/handle/...sequence=1

Isaac Newton’s Hermeneutics of the Symbolic Texts of Chymistry and Biblical Prophecy

PhD thesis by Paul T. Greenham

That early modern natural philosophers such as Isaac Newton were deeply preoccupied by
religious concerns, which were entwined with their study of nature, has become—at last—a
fairly uncontroversial commonplace. In the area of the relationship between Newton’s
natural philosophy, alchemy, and theology, Dobbs’ Janus Faces of Genius has had an
enduring impact. However, the new historiography of alchemy and insights gained from the
application of book history to the history of science—particularly the bookishness of
alchemy—require Newton’s alchemy and theology to be revisited.


347 pages.

https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/bitst...thesis.pdf