5 travel books to get you excited for abroad!

 

books

photo credit:
brody4

Last week, we published “5 Awesome Travel Movies” to help those in need of further wanderlust. This week, we are tackling the best of the travel books. Note: many of these have been made into movies too! Whether you want to get more excited for your travels or need a good beach read, see 5 awesome travel books below.

In no particular order:

On the Road by Jack Kerouac:

This famous American novel, published in the late 1950’s, involves 2 very different friends and their adventures on the open road together. Their road trips take them east-west several times over the years. Their journeys cause them to grow, change and realize they have more in common than once thought.

The Beach by Alex Garland

This 1996 novel depicts the unusual adventure of a young traveler who encounters a map to a secret beach, while backpacking through Thailand. Persuaded by tales of hedonistic pleasure and utopia, he goes yet ultimately finds a dystopian society already on the way to demise.

The Lost Girls by Jennifer Baggett, Holly C. Corbett & Amanda Pressner

This travel memoir tells the story of 3 friends in their late 20’s who decide to give up everything to travel around the world for an entire year. Their high pressure New York City jobs cause them to reflect on their lives and priorities. They leave behind their jobs and boyfriends all to have the adventure of a lifetime. And that they do! They begin their journey in South America, make their way through Asia and finally finish out the year in Australia. This book is serious inspiration for wanderlust, beware!

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert (ok, this one was on the movie list too, but the book is better!)

Another travel memoir written by Elizabeth Gilbert, she recounts her story of a year split between Italy (eat), India (pray) and Bali (love). Gilbert, a woman in her mid-thirties, living in New York City decides she needs a major change in her life. After a gut wrenching divorce, she picks up and leaves for her own adventure. This is a truly inspirational story of one woman who finds herself and happiness through travel.

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

Set in the post-world war I era, the story describes a group of American ex-pats living in Paris. The story moves from France to Spain and back, with a beautiful love story woven in. It’s a  beautiful story of spiritual dissolution and unrealized love.

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