The Lit List – Road Trips

Top ten road trips in books

As we move into a new year, our thoughts often turn towards planning for a holiday. Whether you travel by car or on foot, how about a road trip, this year? The following ten books – some fiction, some non-fiction – might give you some inspiration!

1. The Remainder (2018) Alia Trabucco Zerán (transl. Sophie Hughes). Set in Chile, one generation after the Pinochet era. Feilipe and Iquela go in search of a coffin. Black comedy with elegiac and sensual language. Literary fiction.
2. Company of Liars (2008) Karen Maitland. The Canterbury Tales retold. Each of the motley crew of plague refugees has a story to tell. Each has a secret. Historical fiction.
3. Riddley Walker (1998) Russell Hoban. Set in post-apocalyptic England. As 12-year-old Riddley steps outside the confines of his small world, he finds himself caught up in intrigue and a frantic quest for power. Audiobook recommended. Speculative fiction.
4. The Salt Path (2018) Raynor Winn. Shortly after the author’s husband is diagnosed with a terminal disease, they lose their home. On impulse, they decide to walk the coastal path from Somerset to Dorset. Memoir.
5. The Drive (2013) Tyler Keevil. A call from his Czech girlfriend catapults Trevor into a serious crisis. Desperate to get his mojo back, he blazes down Highway 99 in a rented Dodge Neon. Fiction.
6. The Lincoln Highway (2021) Amor Towles. Emmett is released early from a young offenders’ work farm due to the death of his farmer father. With his mother long gone and the farm repossessed, all he has left is his eight-year-old brother, Billy, and a dream to start a new life in California. But Emmett doesn’t reckon on two friends from the work farm with an entirely different plan. A classic tale of friendship and reckoning in Fifties Americana. Literary fiction.
7. A Walk in the Woods (2006) Bill Bryson. Bryson steps up to the challenge of walking the 2,190+ mile Appalachian Trail. Humorous Travelogue.
8. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (2012) Rachel Joyce. A letter from a former colleague sets Harold on a trip spanning the length of Britain. Fiction.
9. On the Road (1957) Jack Kerouac. Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty roam the United States in a quest for self-knowledge & experience. Quintessential Beat Generation. Autobiography.
10. Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas (1971) Hunter S Thompson. A drug-soaked weekend rampage. Gonzo journalism.