I am on team “I-Wish-I-Could-Travel-Constantly”. But this day and age, travel can be expensive, and we all don’t necessarily have the means or the time to take vacations. While I would drop everything for a trip back to England, that isn’t my situation. What has consistently been in my life since I was a little girl is reading.
Traveling via books has been a source of comfort to me from a very young age. Harry Potter had me traveling to a magical world. Historical fiction favorites had me traveling in time. As a teen, I read anything that would let me experience my dream destination, London.
Books have been a means of transporting the reader into the lives of others. Into new worlds, new locations and new experiences. These 4 books have the locations they take place in at the heart of their stories. You can travel from the highlands of Scotland to the Alaskan frontier. Today, we will be traveling within and beyond. We will span genres and locations. Enjoy the journey!
Let The Great World Spin by Colum McCann
Book Travel Destination: New York City, 1974
This book is a tapestry of life in New York City. A story that masterfully weaves the lives of those in the streets of New York as they watch the tightrope walker above, traversing the distance between the Twin Towers. A story of love, grief, poverty, pain, loss and hope amongst the people of Manhattan.
The vivid voices in this novel create characters that are distinct. Every ordinary moment is elevated with the slow weaving of seemingly separate stories that form the bigger picture of life.
Every character goes about their days, unknowingly connected to each other through the thread of New York City. Ripple effects and clandestine moments where we see no matter what your background, we can all touch each other’s lives.
This beautiful literary work feels as though these could be short stories. It has a nonlinear narrative with several different perspectives being told. The throughline of how events can shape or affect us in different ways, is the heartbeat of this novel.
Kilt Trip by Alexandra Kiley
Book Travel Destination: Scotland
Grab a jacket and get ready to traverse the Scottish Highlands in this Hallmark style love story. Addie Macrae is a travel consultant who is assigned to visit Scotland to help a struggling family tour guide business. She meets tour guide Logan Sutherland who is stubborn and insistent on keeping the business and locations niche.
While Logan’s love for Scotland is at the forefront of his decision making, Addie may have some of her own personal reasons that tie her to Scotland.
With the work deadline looming, can Addie and Logan come to a mutual agreement on how to run the tour company?
While this book is a very standard rom com, it was such a fun way to revisit my personal favorite destination: Scotland. This novel touches on grief and romance and does a great deal of travel within the pages. I kept smiling to myself remembering my own tour of the Scottish Highlands that I had the privilege to take.
The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah
Book Travel Destination: Alaska 1970s
This drama will have you living ruggedly in Alaska’s wilderness. I read this while on an Alaskan cruise and it was quite the juxtaposition. The characters struggled, while I relaxed. Two very different Alaskan experiences were happening.
The Allbright family moves to the Alaskan wilderness on the whims of father, Ernt, after he loses his job. He has many demons from being a POW and decides that living off the grid will be better for him and his family. His volatile nature is reflected in the harsh extremes of the Alaskan wilderness.
The family joins a small but strong community. They come together and help the unprepared Allbrights prep for survival during the harsh winter months.
But as darkness descends on Alaska for months, so does the darkness in Ernt’s mind. The danger outside the family cabin is equal to the danger inside.
The Great Alone is a story of survival, mental illness, perseverance, hope, and finding strength within. The sweeping visuals and harsh realities of survival will make you feel as though you need to dust the snow off yourself when you put this book down.
All That Life Can Afford by Emily Everett
Book Travel Destination: London and Saint-Tropez
Grab yourself a cup of tea because London is calling! In this fish out of water story, Anna is an American who moves to London for college. She struggles financially because she is estranged from her father and her mother has recently passed. It was her and her mother’s dream for Anna to move to London and get a job in the literary world.
Anna begins tutoring and finds a student she connects with, Pippa Wilder. Pippa comes from a very wealthy family. Upon the insistence of the Wilder family mother, she goes along with them for a holiday in Saint-Tropez to continue her tutoring lessons.
Anna gets swept up in the extravagant world of the ultra-wealthy. Anna feels like she is finally getting a taste of the life she has dreamed of but struggles with honoring who she is and where she came from.
This novel explores class, privilege, and the struggle to be true to oneself while embracing the possibilities of reinvention.
The reader gets to experience luxury travel in Saint Tropez. The pages are filled with glamour, parties, wineries, and five-star dining. London is viewed through two different lenses. The lens of Anna struggling to make ends meet, to stepping in to the life of London’s wealthy neighborhoods and nightlife. Enjoy both sides of London in this entertaining novel.
Enjoy Your Book Travel
If you have read or read any of these books, I would love to hear from you! If you would like more recommendations, take a peek at my Amazon bookshelf. Here you can find all the books I’ve read over the past several years. I hope you enjoy your book travels as much as I do!
Leave a Reply