25 Best Travel Books To Read Right Now

by Alex Temblador
Last updated:: 3:00 PM ET, Thu April 16, 2020

PHOTO: Books can take you to far-flung places around the world. (photo via getty / E+ / lechatnoir)

PHOTO: Discover the happiest places in the world in 'The Geography of Bliss.' (Photo via Simon and Schuster)

PHOTO: 'What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding' is a hilarious travelogue. (photo via Makenzie Shelton)

PHOTO: Catfish and Mandala takes readers through Mexico, Japan, and Vietnam. (photo via Picador)

PHOTO: Follow Emily Raboteau as she travels through history and African and Jewish cultures in 'Searching for Zion.' (photo via Grove Atlantic)

PHOTO: Gain a new insight into India with 'India: A Million Mutinies Now.' (photo via Penguin Random House Canada)

PHOTO: Read how Isabelle Eberhardt broke all the rules of decorum to travel. (photo via Alex Temblador)

PHOTO: Sailboat near the Golden Gate bridge. (photo via iStock / Getty Images Plus / pgbrace)

PHOTO: 'Microadventures' explains why small adventures are so great. (photo via Alastair Humphreys)

PHOTO: 'Real Queer America' follows Samantha Allen traveling through conservative areas of the U.S. (photo via Little, Brown and Company)

PHOTO: Freya Stark was one of the most prolific travel writers in the 20th century. (photo via Abrams Books, 2011)

PHOTO: 'I'll Push You' tells the story of the ultimate friend adventure. (photo via Tyndale House Publishers) (Tyndale House Publishers / Maria Feck/laif/Redlux Pictures)

PHOTO: Historic silk route from Tibet to India. (photo via iStock / Getty Images Plus / SB Stock)

PHOTO: Zora Neale Hurston's book 'Tell My Horse' highlights voodoo in Haiti and Jamaica. (photo via Flickr / Regan Vercruysse)

PHOTO: Follow Anthony Bourdain on a global culinary adventure in 'A Cook's Tour.' (photo via Ecco)

PHOTO: Tiziano Terzani visits mystics in Asia in 'A Fortune Teller Told Me.' (photo via Alex Temblador)

PHOTO: Costa Rica World Nature. (Provided by Collette)

PHOTO: A mix between cultural discovery and travelogue, 'Mexican Enough' exemplifies what makes the border areas beautiful. (photo via Simon & Schuster)

country highway in USA. (photo via MBPROJEKT_Maciej_Bledowski / iStock / Getty Images Plus)

PHOTO: Go on a walking tour in Suffolk with a nameless narrator in 'The Rings of Saturn.' (photo via New Directions)

PHOTO: Get inspired to travel long-term with 'Vagabonding.' (photo via Random House)

PHOTO: Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque on Naqsh-e Jahan Square of Isfahan, Iran. (Photo via Leonid Andronov / iStock / Getty Images Plus)

Person in wheelchair at airport. (photo via Manuel-F-O / iStock / Getty Images Plus)

PHOTO: 'The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer' follows Eric Hansen on some quirky adventures around the world. (photo via Vintage / Penguin Random House)

PHOTO: Get an inside look at all the places that people say 'Don't Go There!' (photo via Adam Fletcher)

PHOTO: Read a variety of amazing travel essays in 'The Best American Travel Writing' anthologies. (photo via Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

Travel to a Faraway Land

1/26

We may not be able to travel the world right now, but we can explore it: through travel books. This collection of travel books will introduce you to interesting characters and cultures, make you feel like you're on an adventure, and have you planning your next getaway.

The Geography of Bliss

2/26

Find some joy in reading The Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World. In this novel, you'll get to know Eric Weiner, who set out in search of the happiest places in the world like Switzerland, Bhutan, and Asheville, North Carolina. The book will take you around the world to discover what makes us happy, offering some cultural insight, historical background, and a few laughs along the way.

What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding: A Memoir

3/26

While Kristen Newman's friends were getting married and having kids in their 20s and 30s, she was having sexy, wild and memorable solo travel experiences. You won't believe the crazy adventures Newman has with attractive Bedouins, Finnish poker players, and Argentinean priests. What I Was Doing While You Were Breedingwill have you laughing aloud in quarantine.

Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam

4/26

Born in Vietnam and raised in California, Andrew X. Pham quit his job at United Airlines and went on a year-long bicycle journey after his sister committed suicide. His biking adventure took him through Mexico, on a thousand-mile loop from Narita to Kyoto, Japan, and eventually to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City), Vietnam. Pham highlights his cultural experiences as a Vietnamese American traveling the world, from mistaken ethnic identities to feeling caught between two cultures, American and Vietnamese. Read all this and more in Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam.

Searching for Zion

5/26

Searching for Zion follows Emily Rabiteau, a biracial American who goes on a journey to discover the history of black Jews in Israel. To do this, she travels around the globe to speak to Rastafarians, African Hebrew Israelites, Evangelicals, and Ethiopian Jews, ultimately asking the question: "Have you found the home you're looking for?"

India: A Million Mutinies Now

6/26

As a man of Indian heritage and born in Trinidad and Tobago, renowned novelist V.S. Naipaul wrote three travelogues about India. India: A Million Mutinies Now is the third among the travel books and offers insight to the experiences Naipaul had, who he met, and his take on religious and political frictions that India faces. Readers will be able to picture India to its fullest thanks to Naipaul's descriptions of culture and society in India.

The Nomad: Diaries of Isabelle Eberhardt

7/26

Isabelle Eberhardt is one of the most impressive travelers of all time. She shocked societies in the late 19th century for her cross-dressing and adventures through the Middle East. Isabelle reinvented herself as a man, did drugs, wandered the Saraha on horseback, and had numerous adventures, all of which are told in The Nomad: Diaries of Isabelle Eberhardt.If she hadn't drowned mysteriously in the desert at 27, we would surely have plenty more wonderful stories about her life.

Love With A Chance Of Drowning

8/26

Torre de Roche took a big chance when she decided to join an Argentinian man she had just met in San Francisco on a voyage around the world on a small sailboat. Love With a Chance of Drowningrecounts de Roche's whirlwind of a romance and the challenges of sailing around the world when you're scared of deep water and in a new relationship.

Microadventures

9/26

Put Microadventures by Alastair Humphreys on your travel reading list. Humphreys' book focuses on microadventures, which "takes the spirit of big adventure and squeezes it into a day or even a few hours." With photographs, tips, and microadventure ideas, you'll find plenty of inspiration to have your own microadventures after the pandemic (perhaps even now in your own backyard!).

Real Queer America: LGBT Stories from Red States

10/26

What do queer spaces in conservative 'red' states look like? Reporter Samantha Allen, who is also transgender, hit the road to find out in Real Queer America: LGBT Stories from Red States. She takes readers from Provo, Utah, to the Bible Belt, and recounts her experiences at drag shows, political rallies, and other queer spaces. In addition to meeting some of the activists in these areas, Allen will delight readers with fascinating stories and show readers that they can experience "something gay every day," even in the most conservative states.

A Winter in Arabia: A Journey Through Yemen

11/26

Freya Stark was a British traveler who became famous for traveling to remote places in Turkey and the Middle East during the early 20th century when most women (even men) didn't do such things. She's written about two dozen travel books about her travel experiences, such as A Winter in Arabia: A Journey Through Yemen. Set in 1937-1938, you'll follow Stark as she searches for an ancient South Arabian city. Readers will get a look at life among tribes who lived in those areas such as their rivalries and beauty rituals among the women.

I'll Push You: A Journey of 500 Miles, Two Best Friends, and One Wheelchair

12/26

Justin Skeesuck and Patrick Gray grew up together as best friends, and their friendship continued on after Justin was diagnosed with a neuromuscular disease that made him unable to use his arms and legs. Determined to live life to the fullest, Justin and Patrick set off together on the 500-mile Camino de Santiago trek. If you're looking for an amazing story of friendship, bromance, and strength, I'll Push You: A Journey of 500 Miles, Two Best Friends, and One Wheelchairis the one for you.

Lands of Lost Borders: A Journey on the Silk Road

13/26

Kate Harris always wanted to be an explorer, and she set her sights high: to become a scientist and go to Mars. In between Oxford and MIT, Harris and her friend, Mel, hit the historic Silk Road on bikes. Follow Harris in Lands of Lost Borders: A Journey on the Silk Roadand discover a part of the world that has always intrigued travelers, and taught Harris many life lessons, like breaking boundaries we set for ourselves.

Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica

14/26

Zora Neale Hurston was an African American author in the early 20th century who highlighted the struggles of African Americans in the South. Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaicais Hurston's travel account of her time in Haiti and Jamaica, exploring voodoo practices as an initiate of the religion in the 1930s. The prolific writer offers firsthand insight into the voodoo religion and how it impacts the culture of the islands.

A Cook's Tour Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines

15/26

During quarantine, many are turning to their kitchens to satisfy their wanderlust. For travel foodies, we'd suggest A Cook's Tour Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisinesby Anthony Bourdain. Follow Bourdain through Vietnamese fishing villages, eating smoked fish in saunas in Russia, chowing down on yakitori with Japanese salarymen, and tasting the delicacy of a deep-fried Mars Bar in Glasgow. Bourdain's culinary adventures will inspire you to try your hand at making global delicacies.

A Fortune-Teller Told Me: Earthbound Travels in the Far East

16/26

Tiziano Terzani, an Italian journalist living in Asia, visited a fortune teller in Hong Kong who warned him not to fly for a whole year. Heeding her warning, Terzani set off on a year-long adventure on foot, boat, bus, car, and train, visiting soothsayers, sorcerers and shamans in Burma, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Mongolia, Japan, Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia. Readers will discover how mysticism plays a role in Asia by reading A Fortune-Teller Told Me: Earthbound Travels in the Far East.

Avoiding Prison and Other Noble Vacation Goals

17/26

Avoiding Prison and Other Noble Vacation Goals: Adventures in Love and Dangeris a must-read for risk-takers and travelers who enjoy a bit of danger. Wendy Dale always finds herself in adventurous, dangerous, and sometimes illegal situations like crossing international borders illegally. Dale's travels even take her to a prison in Costa Rica where she falls in love with a man and risks a lot to clear his name.

Mexican Enough: My Life between the Borderlines

18/26

In Mexican Enough: My Life Between the Borderlines, travelers will get to know Stephanie Elizondo Griest, a South Texas woman who travels to Mexico when she turns 30 to connect with her Mexican heritage. While she may have crossed the border to discover her cultural identity, Griest finds herself connecting with people engaged in prominent social issues of the country like a murdered gay activist, families of undocumented workers in Texas, luchadores (professional wrestlers), rebel teachers marching for rights in Oaxaca, and indigenous resistance fighters in prison. Mexican Enough will give you a look at Mexico beyond the tourist sites.

Blue Highways

19/26

William Least Heat-Moon was interested in seeing America, but not the big city lights of Vegas or New York. In Blue Highways, Heat-Moon travels backroads and highways to some of the country's smallest towns like Remote, Oregon, Simplicity, Virginia, Why, Arizona, and Whynot, Mississippi. Meet some amazing people and read about Heat-Moon's adventures through a country you thought you knew so well.

The Rings of Saturn

20/26

Though The Rings of Saturn by W.G. Sebald is a novel, we've included it on this list because it has long been praised for taking readers on a most wonderful journey. The book follows a narrator on a walking tour through Suffolk, the east coast of England. Readers will enjoy curious photographs, a narrator who comes in contact with eccentric things like a matchstick model of the Temple of Jerusalem, and whose mind wanders to random topics like the Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi and the natural history of the herring.

Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel

21/26

Some travelers may want to hit the road for a long-term trip after this pandemic ends. But before you do, read Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel. In each chapter, Potts gives readers advice on how to negotiate time off from work and prepare for a long-term vacation. While the book was published in 2002, it has been updated and seems to still hold up, according to Amazon reviews.

The Cypress Tree: A Love Letter to Iran

22/26

Kamin Mohammadi's family fled the 1979 Iran Revolution for Britain when she was nine years old. The Cypress Tree: A Love Letter to Iran recounts Mohammadi's return to Iran at 27 when she hopes to discover her Iranian self and the story of her family. Readers will get a whole new perspective of Iran in this travel memoir.

Moving Violations: War Zones, Wheelchairs, and Declarations of Independence

23/26

John Hockenberry has been using a wheelchair since 1976 when he became paraplegic after an auto accident. As a reporter and commentator, Hockenberry tells his story of traveling the world in Moving Violations: War Zones, Wheelchairs, and Declarations of Independence. His honest tone will provide readers insight to the inaccessibility of many popular places in the world, like the NYC subway system, as well as the lengths he'll go for a story, like riding a donkey to meet Kurd refugees in Iraq.

The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer

24/26

Eric Hansen has a way of getting himself into the most peculiar of situations. In his travelogue, The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer,you'll follow Hansen as he survives a cyclone, drinks mind-altering kava in Vanuatu, and joins topless dancers on a bird-watching tour in California. Hansen's experiences from the Maldives to Washington Heights are fun, quirky, and ever entertaining.

Don't Go There: From Chernobyl to North Korea-one man's quest to lose himself and find everyone else in the world's strangest places

25/26

Ever been told not to go somewhere because it's too dangerous or difficult to visit? Adam Fletcher had, and he decided not to listen. Don't Go There: From Chernobyl to North Koreais the story of Fletcher going to places travelers usually don't go like North Korea. Follow along on Fletcher's wild adventures as he's chased by Croatian police, meets the Devil incarnate in Moldova, visits Chernobyl, and experiences a Chinese blizzard.

The Best American Travel Writing

26/26

Each year, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt publishes an anthology called The Best American Travel Writing comprised of some of the best travel essays published in various outlets the year before. So if you like to read shorter travel stories written by a variety of travel writers about places all over the world, then The Best American Travel Writing series is your best bet. While the 2020 anthology won't come out until November, take advantage of versions from previous years dating back to 2000.

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