I’m always guilty of bringing too many books when packing for a trip; being a firm believer in the one-book-per-day rule. For those who, like me, feel like our vacation packing isn’t complete unless it’s weighed down with novels, here are a handful of reading suggestions for various kinds of journeys.
- For the beach
Not exactly a fluffy beach read, Ian McEwan’s “On Chesil Beach” is a devastating, gorgeous portrait of a young couple on their wedding night at a seaside hotel in Dorset, and of the intricate baggage they carry. Or, if you’d prefer something a bit lighter, Beatriz Williams’ novels all suit beach bags well; “The Summer Wives” is an engrossing tale of an actor returning to the island town that changed her life long ago. Even lighter? Consider the best beach read ever (even though I don’t remember it actually involving a beach): Kevin Kwan’s frothy “Crazy Rich Asians,” a tale of love and excess that’ll have you giggling on every page.
- For a boat trip
Should you need an aquatic thriller, Catherine Steadman’s debut thriller “Something in the Water,” in which a couple on honeymoon in Bora Bora make a mysterious discovery while scuba diving, will definitely keep you up at night. Also a seductive page-turner: Maile Meloy’s “Do Not Become Alarmed,” in which a family’s children go missing on a cruise vacation.
- For a road trip
Jade Chang’s delightful novel “The Wangs vs. the World” follows a family whose patriarch — having lost the family fortune — decides to take his kids on a cross-country drive. Jesmyn Ward’s National Book Award-winning “Sing, Unburied, Sing” is a more somber type of road trip, in which a Mississippi mother packs her children into the car to collect her boyfriend from prison. And one of my all-time favorites: Kazuo Ishiguro’s gemlike novel “The Remains of the Day,” in which an aging butler travels the English countryside in his employer’s borrowed car in the 1950s, pondering how the war changed the world as he knew it.