I’m packing again. I leave in three days, with my father.

He wanted to find an adventure. The kind with dusty backstreets and far-flung feelings. I suggested cobras in baskets, warm sunshine, a camel and vintage motorcycle sidecars.

He responded “We are going to Egypt?!”

Funny how those interchange. No. We are going to Morocco.

Morocco was closer, I’d done it before (easier to plan without help), and it offers pretty perfect weather in April.

It also offered something my father and I have long talked about completing — the ferry crossing to Tangier.

I know Tangier may disappoint me. It’s one of those destinations like Zanzibar or Katmandu, which lives in my head via old spy novels and Indiana-Jones-style ’80s films, where someone is forever whizzing around in a taxi, driven by a man in a turban … who may be friend or may be foe. You have to wait till the third act to figure out what’s afoot. I may have to do the same with Tangier. I shall report back.

In my mind, I will skirt through laneways and haggle over piles of dates and oranges. I want to see a sunset over the Strait of Gibraltar. I want to hang out with my dad over a really good hotel breakfast. God, don’t you just love a really good hotel breakfast?

I read Tangerine, a novel set in Tangier, back in 2022. That was right before Chris and I took our first (and only other) trip to Morocco. We went to Marrakech and Fez, but the book sufficed to drop me into Morocco mentally, and I’d read it again. I wrote about it and others in this previous post.

I think it’s high time to throw a few more great novels on this travel blog, should any of you be in need of a book for a flight or just for a Sunday on a sofa.

I’ve kept a spreadsheet of what I’ve read in the last year, marking whether I liked it or not at the finish.

Here are my favorite books that I consumed in 2025 and early 2026, summed up in a few sentences. There’s also a place I’d suggest traveling whilst reading each one. Please post your own favorites in the comments below.

Scare Yourself to Sleep

Calling this a ‘paranoid horror thriller’ is very apt, as it’s a true freakish mind-bender of a story, where a young couple has purchased a historic rural home they plan to fix up and flip. A knock at the door presents a family, claiming they used to live there. They’d just like to bring their kids inside, to have a look around, for nostalgia’s sake. But then … they won’t leave.

Read it in … New England in a rustic, countryside Airbnb. Or don’t, cause you might lose your mind.

There are still places in New Orleans that don’t exist on any map.
These are the places where you can feel the tensions of being in a harlot’s town.
–– Ed Lee, Buttermilk Graffiti

A Feast for the Emotions

This cookbook was published in 2018, but as we stare down the abyss of this never-ending, misplaced, soul-sacrificing aggression towards immigrants in America, it has never been more poignant or more apt. It’s a cookbook, but it’s also Chef Ed Lee’s musings on his own travels in search of food. And, on his own feelings, as the child of Korean immigrants. Can a cookbook make you laugh and cry in a single page? Yes. Can we appreciate that ’65 Rangoon Red Mustang made the cover? Undoubtably. I think the 1965 Mustang is the greatest car America ever made. I think this might be the greatest cookbook ever written. Bravo, Edward Lee.

Read it in … New Orleans, which he captures in delicious color than I’ve ever managed.

The Ultimate Beach Read

The Wager is historic non-fiction that reads with the pace of a novel, as David Grann hard-earned his authoritative voice, researching hundreds of accounts and ledgers of this real-life shipwreck that happened in the 1700s. It’s the tale of the HMS Wager, one of the finest vessels of the day, sent out to steal treasure from Spain. A storm arrives. There’s a shipwreck upon the rocks off the coast of freezing Patagonia, and the story unfurls with mutiny, possible cannibalism, wild survival and a court case. Because, against all odds, some of these sailors made it back to England.

Read it … with a view of the ocean. I consumed (and I mean consumed) this book in Soliman Bay, about 20 minutes north of Tulum. The hotel was the Jashita. The day was perfect. I was devoted, only pausing for a pina colada and to carry this book, held aloft, past the breakers.

How to Make Italy Terrifying, 101

Italy isn’t a country I would immediately choose to set a horror novel. It’s Italy. The pasta is warm, the men are hot, the accordian is fiesty, the cobblestones are smooth and supple. How is anyone afraid of Italy? I’ll tell you how. I put this book on my Kindle and flew to Bologna, alone. My Airbnb maybe wasn’t quite as cute as it looked online. Hey … so what if you have to do the whole old-elevator, cage-yourself-inside thing … late at night … where you consider that you could be trapped? So what if you need 27 keys to access the place and the ancient hallway has lights on timers that keep going off before you get the key in lock? So what if you can hear people through the walls? It’s fine!

If you’re in this situation, do not crack this bitch open, to read about a family reunion in Tuscany, where the house they rent is just ‘off,’ and the youngest adult child is pleading to leave, but no one will listen. Then the bad things start. Shudder. So good.

Read it … in Italy, duh.

“Seems more plausible that Hell is some revenge fantasy concocted by unhappy people so they could punish all the happy people in their minds.”
― Alison Espach, The Wedding People

A Heartfelt, Funny Escape

You want good things for our protagonist here, a lonely, frustrated woman going through a particularly brutal marriage breakup. She books a weekend at a gorgeous hotel she found on Instagram … with the intention of ending her life in the nicest suite. The hotel, however, has been rented out for a wedding weekend, and this obnoxious, selfish bride is not tolerating a suicide. Not on her big day! Nope. What ensues is hilarious, but also ardently introspective. This one is a romping, poignant good time.

Read it … in Newport, Rhode Island, where it’s set. I think this is perfect for any location, as it deals with the travel we all do in our own heads. You’ll feel seen, no matter where you are.

A Brilliant Twist On Adolescence

The final book on this list is one I finished a few weeks ago. It sits now on a side table in my kitchen. I glance over at it often, wishing I could write this well.

The plot is impossible to sum up succinctly, except to say it’s really a story of first friendship. There’s a teenage serial killer, as implied, but that’s almost the side plot. It’s the 1980s in a little Midwestern town, where football players and band jerks, goth kids and nerds all navigate the scariest landscape of all — high school. It’s gory and funny, but also so heart-wrenching, because we all have that long-ago best friend, the freedom of that shitty first car, sunny days and favorite bands, the gulp cup, the best burger, and the first crush. I don’t keep a lot of books, but I’m keeping this copy. It stays here, as a reminder of literary perfection.

Read it … on the Great American Road Trip along Route 66, in some little Texas town, or, home again, on your mama’s back porch.

Well y’all, that’s it for now. Please hit me up with some great options for my next read in the comments! Dispatches imminent from old Tangier!