To me, there is nothing like sitting on a beach with a paperback book and immersing myself in a good story. I'm always on the hunt for a new beach book to read, but along the way I've found a few that I enjoyed enough to give them pride of place on my book shelf. When in doubt, some of these are my go-to travel books, and you can tell by how worn down the spines are.
If you're looking for a few recommendations for your next trip, I've put together a list of five books I've read that each fit a different type of reader in order to offer something for everyone. Some inspire travel and some are just books with a great message inside them. Either way, happy reading!
The Innocents Abroad
By Mark Twain
In 1867, Mark Twain set out to explore the Holy Land, and through his journey he documented his encounters along the way. What he learned, and then passed on to us through his writing, was how ignorant he and his fellow travelers had been to customs and cultures outside of their own familiar ones. It's definitely a witty yet eye-opening piece of work that any traveler who has been to a foreign land can relate to.
One of my favorite quotes: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.” "
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Eat Pray Love
By Elizabeth Gilbert
I have to admit, Gilbert's experiences are definitely inspiring. In fact, there are "Eat Pray Love" pilgrimages that people can take to follow in her actual footsteps.
One of my favorite quotes: “I'm choosing happiness over suffering, I know I am. I'm making space for the unknown future to fill up my life with yet-to-come surprises.”
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The Prophet
by Kahlil Gibran
This book isn't so much a book about travel as it is a about life in general. Many travelers know that the farther your journey takes you, the more grounded you become as a person. This book is an excellent example of that. It's about a prophet who is about to travel home after twelve long years away and he stops to tell a group of people the lessons he has learned in his life. I myself have learned some important things from Gibran's words.
This book has actually recently been made into a movie staring Salma Hayek and Liam Neeson and was released in August 2015.
One of my favorite quotes: “We wanderers, ever seeking the lonelier way, begin no day where we have ended another day; and no sunrise finds us where sunset left us. Even while the earth sleeps we travel. We are the seeds of the tenacious plant, and it is in our ripeness and our fullness of heart that we are given to the wind and are scattered.”
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On The Island
by Tracey Garvis Graves
If you're into romantic fiction but tend to shy away from bringing chick-lit to the beach, have no fear, On The Island is the book for you. It not only has a eye-catching (but not embarrassing) cover, but inside is a unique story that travel lovers will have a hard time putting down. It's about Anna, a young teacher who is supposed to be spending the summer in the Maldives tutoring a sixteen year old, TJ, who is behind on his school work due to health reasons. Unfortunately, their seaplane crashes and they're left stranded on a uninhabited island and they're forced to find a way to survive for years when all they have is each other.
One of my favorite quotes: “If she had gotten sick, the only thing I could have done was watch her suffer. I didn’t know if I could make it without her. The sound of her voice, her smile, her– those were the things that made living on the island bearable."
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The Geography Of Bliss
by Eric Weiner
This book is actually a memoir by a National Public Radio foreign correspondent who decided to travel the world in an actual pursuit of happiness. After spending much time in war-torn areas, Eric sets off to visits several countries known for being the happiest in the world in the hopes that he will find what exactly why that is. It's a really uplifting story about one man's odyssey in order to restore his fait in humanity again.
One of my favorite quotes from: “I've always believed that happiness is just around the corner. The trick is fining the right corner.”
Have you read any of these? Let me know what you think about them in the comments below.