Top Ten Tuesday (79)

Top Ten Favorite Travel Books

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. It’s awesome. Every Tuesday, the lovely folks over at The Broke and the Bookish post a top ten list topic so that book lovers like you and me can pour over our shelves and make our own lists. You can check out all the other Top Ten Tuesday’s on their site!

When I first heard this week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic, I was like, “YAY! LOVE traveling!” And then I realized that basically half of the books I’ve ever read have involved travel of some kind. For every book I read that takes place in one spot, there are two more that involve a trip, a vacation, a journey–they’re kind of everywhere. When I sat down to compile my list, I found a couple of things: One, there’s a couple of books on my list that will likely be on nearly EVERYONE’S list. Oh well, they’re awesome. The others? They’re less about modern travel than they are about…walking around. Wandering around from one place to another. Way more fantasies on my list than I anticipated, too, which just makes me happy beyond words.

The first of many fantasies on my list, THE NAME OF THE WIND by Patrick Rothfuss is about travel of the gypsy kind–literally. Kvothe and his family are gypsies, and as we spend time with him recounting his childhood, we hear these amazing tales of what life was like for him and his close-knit band of travelling performers. This same kind of wandering freedom continues in book 2.

So we go from gypsy wanderers to a story that sees its pivotal action take place on an airplane. THE STATISTICAL PROBABILITY OF LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT, aside from being a mouthful, is a really lovely story about falling in love and family and lots of other emotional self-discovery-ish things. Bonus that the relationship between Hadley and Oliver is outstanding.

I really enjoyed UNBREAK MY HEART, not just because we got a love interest who was charming, confident and a GINGER, but because we get to travel by BOAT ON THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. I mean what book aside from this one has that setting? None that I can think of. Points for variety, friends.

SIGH. Friends, have you read this book yet? No? I’m bummed for you, because it’s GORGEOUS. And the travel that is at its center is, again, more of the fantastical kind, given that Rose spends a portion of this book being hauled across vast lands far away from her home by a huge, white bear. But travel makes another kind of appearance in EAST: Rose has an ITCH, friends. She’s always wandering off and going where the wind takes her. It leads her on some important journeys.

TRAVEL BY AIR BEASTIE. Just the descriptions of what it’s like on the Leviathan make Scott Westerfeld‘s book excellent (I just listened to the audiobook, narrated by the absolutely stellar Alan Cumming). But that’s just the main mode of transport for one of my now-favorite female protagonists, Derryn Sharp (Sharpe? Audio, friends. It’s hell on spelling.) And let’s not forget our leading man, Alek, who travels at least in the beginning by a mechanical, two-legged contraption known as a walker. The Leviathan and the walker take Derryn and Alek all across Europe during the early days of World War I.

The ULTIMATE walking book, and the ultimate fantasy. The Fellowship uses their own two feet–and sometimes horses–on an epic journey across Middle Earth. I just couldn’t make this list without including these books.

Percy and friends go on some crazy adventures, friends, and their methods of getting from one place to another vary from common automobiles to flying mechanical dragons. (I KNOW.) They walk through labyrinths, swim, take trains and sometimes, but not often, fly. Like pretty much all of the books on this list, Percy and the gang don’t just travel to no end–they go places to DO THINGS, and those destinations and the things that happen to them on their way make their stories plain awesome.

In my opinion, the best road trip book there is. I get a hankering to reread this super book at least once a year. Usually right around now, actually. IN FACT! I’m going on a road trip (not a huge one, though) myself THIS WEEKEND, and I might bring this book along just for fun.

I feel like these next two books will be no strangers to this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, but they really are so perfect for it, aside from the obvious. WANDERLOVE is not only about the travel–backpacking through Central America–in a literal sense, but also in the figurative sense as well. Plus, we get to see bookishly visit some awesome places in this one.

Much like WANDERLOVE, JUST ONE DAY is about more than the travel, although it serves as a really great metaphor for Lulu. She basically breaks out of her shell and goes traveling around Paris for one day with a complete stranger. It’s such a special story. Willem is mysterious and confident, and the way his relationship–despite its brevity–impacts Lulu is THE BEST.