What is your favorite book to read when on the road? Not necessarily travel or location related, but what do you like to read when on the road?
Looking for some suggestions on great travel reads before my next trip out and just wondering what people enjoy to read. Personally, Kerouac's "Dharma Bums" and Herman Hesse's "Siddhartha" come everywhere with me. The former is the author's best work, in my opinion and the latter is a great work on finding your own way through the world. They are small and easy to carry, but are fantastic to read slowly and several times.
I'm reading "The State of Africa" as I'm tooling around East Africa currently and think it is a great history on Africa.
Reply to this I usually take along something light, relaxing and easy to read.
Reply to this I love to read light fiction stories while on vacation. Nothing too heavy. I prefer ones that are set in the destination that I'm visiting.
Reply to this At the moment, I am reading Into the wild by Jon Krakauer, a true story of an American guy who went into Alaska after giving all his money ($25,000) to charity, abandoning his car in the desert & burning all his cash. Very interesting to read when I am travelling north at the moment. I also want to read into thin air by the same author about the Everest disaster.
I also like reading Michael Palin's books - Full Circle is a good read for travelling the Pacific rim & his book called 'Himalaya' - he is a traveller not a climber! Just like me!
I like reading books I can just pick up at any time & they are realitively light (hearted) & ofcourse easy to carry!
Reply to this I love to read fiction that too science fictions on travelling.
Reply to this Cycling Back to Happiness - Adventure on the North Sea Cycle Route, by Bernie Friend
Very good!
Reply to this Just finished Smile When You're Lying: Confessions of a Rogue Travel Writer by Chuck Thompson ... and it's a nice, light read about the travel industry. Kind of like Hunter S. Thompson or Anthony Bourdain writes a travel book. He's a former travel writer for several publicaions (who is very cynical about the travel industry) who was sick of writing sugarcoated articles and wanted to write an uncensored memoir about his travel experiences and destinations that his former employers and editors would never let him get away with. The stories and experiences can be a little sordid and seedy, but acerbic and funny.
Reply to this Another one for my 'to get list' Cary. That sounds like a very good read. 😊
Reply to this Travel Writing: I would suggest Jupiter's Travels....it's the book that i first caught the travel bug from, it's also quite interesting comparing the places of today to what they were like in the 70s.
Fiction: That all depends on your tastes, I'm currently working my way through Arthur C Clarkes library since his death earlier this year. but I understand sci fi isn't for everyone.
I would syggest Scott R Bakker's Prince of Nothing trilogy to anyone though, even if they HATE fantasy, because it is unlike anything else. Imagine Lord of the Rings, take out all the elves and orcs, remoteness, wooden characters, uneccessary landscape discriptions (actaully take out EVERYTHING), replace them with oodles of politics, sex, social commentary, and religious hatred, and then have it wriiten by a proffersor of phylosophy.
Oh, and although I'm not enamoured by Bill Brysons travel writing, his A Shory History of Nearly Everything is a brilliant book. answers lots of questions you'd never thought to ask.
And I'd like to second the reconomdation of Into the Wild....a great book, and if you get the chance catch the movie too, Sean Penn is a great director.
Can you guess that i work in a book shop?
Reply to this Prince of Nothing sounds interesting. I´ll check that out. And I love Short History of Nearly Everything, great book.
However, I have to disagree with Into the Wild. The kid was an incompetent idiot and people treating him as some romantic in the likes of Thoreau simply boggles my mind. Sorry, some things irk me and I have a hard time holding back, and that is one of them... Actually, I go off on it in my next blog cause it kind of reminds me of the W in Torres del Paine.
Also, just finished 100 Years of Solitude and White Fang, both amazing books.
Reply to this I like reading adventure books when travelling. Thrillers are also good.
Anyway, I think I'm going to follow the recommendation on this topic. Thanks!😊
Reply to this Jupiter's Travels is the all time classic - well worth buying and a very, very good read!!! Educational too!
Reply to this What is Jupiters Travels about Adrian? I´ve never heard of it before...
Reply to this Are you being sarcastic?
It is like the iconic one man and his bike hit the road and see the world book, making current day wannabes Ewan McGregor and sidekick Charley (if you know who they are) look like poor imitations.
An old Triumph bike and 63,000 miles of riding - it doesn't get much better than that!
It is the adventure of a lifetime that sadly many of us will only achieve through the pages of such an excellent book.
There is another book by the same author, Dreaming of Jupiter, but I haven't read it!
Reply to this No, actually for once in my life I wasn´t.
And, if anyone is interested in hearing why I hate Into the Wild:
http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Chile/Magallanes/Torres-del-Paine/blog-353183.html
Reply to this Personally I recommend either a book you don't mind reading over and over again, something that provides a new thought to you each time you turn the page anew - I lugged around Kafka's
Metamorphosis and Other Short Stories because it was something I could never tire of. However, many hostels have a "take a book, leave a book" library that's always helpful. I bought a cheap paperback at a discount store somewhere along the road and just swapped my way through my journey, giving books I'd never heard of a try.
Reply to this When in Thailand, you just HAVE to read The Beach. It will give you an interesting perspective on Bangkok and may just make you look a little differently at the islands 😊
Good luck,
Zank
Reply to this When I travel, I like to read a good biography. Sometimes I found myself in the same place where the person that I am reading about had been, and it is interesting to learn how others' perceive things. A good one to read now is Obama's, if you have not read it yet.
Reply to this Yup, Jupiter's Travels is a must.
On bios I would suggest "Things the Grandchildren Should Know" by Mark Oliver Everett, the lead singer of the Eels. Even if your not into the Eels (and who isn't?) this dude has had one hell of a tragic life. A real page turner.
I'm also currently reading Call of the Wild, a diary of a Scottish desk-jockey who picks up, and takes off to Alaska, builds a cabin, learns to drive sleigh dogs and lives in the wilderness for a year. And crucially,
doesn't die through lack of basic knowledge.
Reply to this Off The Rails
by Tim Cope & Chris Hatherly
"the true story of two twenty-year old Australians who travelled for fourteen months on recumbent bicycles from Russia, across Siberia and Mongolia, to Beijing. It is as much a story of perseverance, passion, and belief as it is about the people and remarkable landscapes of Siberia and Mongolia. "
-I Really ejoyed this one
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