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The Best Books About Road Trips
By: Angela & Melissa
Updated:
As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, we may earn a referral fee from qualifying purchases.Over the years, we’ve researched books set in many different locations for our Read Around the World and Read Around the USA reading challenges. Along the way, however, we’ve discovered that some of our favorite books are those that focus on the journey rather than the destination. With that in mind, we’ve compiled a list of the best fiction books about road trips.
If you found your way to this post looking for recommendations of audiobooks to listen during a road trip, rather than books about road trips, don’t worry – we’ve got you covered for that as well. We have two lists for you to choose from: the best audiobooks to listen to on road trips with adults and the best audiobooks for family road trips with kids.
20 Fiction Books About Road Trips
The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise
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Book Summary
After a fall, Louise’s daughter insists that a full-time caregiver move in to assist 84-year-old Louise with daily life. Like many independent seniors, Louise wants no part of this arrangement. She’s still perfectly capable of pouring her own vodka each day.
Tanner is twenty-one and needs a place to live. She’d love to find a way to make a living in her pajamas playing video games instead of dealing with the real world. Since she knows the reality is that she needs money, she takes the opportunity when a chance to be a live-in caregiver falls in her lap.
Tanner and Louise are doing okay as roommates, mostly ignoring each other until Tanner starts noticing questionable things around the house. For example, the garden shed is locked up like Fort Knox, and the news reporting on a jewelry heist with a suspect who looks like Louise.
When Louise packs a bag and insists she and Louise must leave town in the middle of the night, they begin what might be the most incredible adventure of their lives.
The Book Girls Say…
This well-rounded and humorous book crosses genres from contemporary fiction to mystery and romance.
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West With Giraffes
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Book Summary
West With Giraffes is a charming tale of adventure that takes you on the ride of a lifetime from the East Coast of the US to the West, alongside a rowdy 17-year-old, a grumpy older man, and two giraffes. The year is 1938, and no American zoo has successfully housed giraffes before. The female zoo director of the San Diego Zoo believes she can do it. The giraffes have just survived a hurricane en route to the East Coast, and Riley Jones, the curmudgeonly head zookeeper, is responsible for safely transporting the giraffes from New York City to San Diego.
America is still in the throes of the Great Depression, and the Dust Bowl conditions continue to ravage the drought-stricken Southern Plains states. A coast-to-coast trek with giant animals is no easy feat. Jones begrudgingly teams up with a starving teenager named Woody to help him make the journey. The adventures along the way include run-ins with circus con artists, being tailed by a female photographer looking for a big scoop, an emotional visit to Woody’s hometown, and so much more.
At its heart, this is a coming-of-age story. Now, at the age of 105, Woody recounts his 12-day cross-country trip with Jones and the giraffes and how it shaped his life.
The Book Girls Say…
In writing this historical fiction novel, author Lynda Rutledge started with the true story of two giraffes being transported cross-country in the 1930s and then imagined what that road trip might have been like. She includes real newspaper clippings throughout the book to indicate to readers the parts of the story that are based on actual facts.
After we both gave this book 5 stars, we’ve recommended it to everyone we know! From the insights it gives to life across America in the late 1930s to the growing relationships between characters, including the humans and the giraffes, we can’t recommend this book highly enough!
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West with Giraffes Book Club Questions & Guide
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Books Set in the 1930s
Intergenerational Novels: Books that Connect Generations
Unforgettable Dust Bowl Books
Readers’ Favorite Books: 2023 Edition
Best Audiobook Kindle Unlimited Recommendations
PS: We also have a printable West with Giraffes book club guide available on Etsy, including discussion questions, bonus giraffe content, custom bookmarks, and more!
So Long, Chester Wheeler
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Book Summary
Lewis is young, gay, and out of work. When he learns that his insufferable, homophobic neighbor, Chester Wheeler, is in need of end-of-life care, he doesn’t need the headache. But he does need the money. Lewis agrees to run errands and be on call for other things Chester might need. The two exchange barbs, bicker, and push each other’s buttons. But when Chester tells Lewis his dying wish, Lewis can’t say no.
Chester wants Lewis to drive him from Buffalo to Arizona in his rusty Winnebago so that he can see his ex-wife, who he hasn’t seen in 32 years, one last time. One week and two thousand miles is a long time to spend together. But along the way, Chester will reveal some of his life-long secrets. This vulnerability leads to understanding and a surprising new friendship.
The Book Girls Say…
Several of Catherine Ryan Hyde’s novels have been very popular with our readers! Another of her novels, Allie and Bea, features another unlikely duo – 15-year-old Allie and 78-year-old Bea – road-tripping up the Pacific Coast in an old van.
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Mrs. Nash’s Ashes
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Book Summary
Millicent never expected to be traveling to Key West with a portion of the ashes of her elderly best friend in her backpack. But before Mrs. Nash died, Millie promised that she would reunite her with the woman she loved 80 years earlier.
She also didn’t expect to be on a road trip with a cynical writer. Millie met Hollis through her ex’s MFA program and was surprised to find him also stranded at the airport due to flight cancellations. They agree to make the long drive together, getting to know each other. While Mille thought this trip was about Mrs. Nash’s love story, maybe it’s really about her own.
The Book Girls Say…
Millie and Hollis encounter entertaining oddities all along their east coast road trip, from peculiar bed-and-breakfasts to unusual small-town festivals. This book strikes the right balance between humor, romance, and emotions.
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November Road
Book Summary
This crime novel is set against the assassination of JFK and centers on a cat-and-mouse like chase across 1960s America.
Frank Guidry is very loyal to New Orleans mob boss Carlos Marcello, but such loyalty isn’t enough to protect you when you know too much. Within hours of JFK’s murder, everyone with ties to Marcello is turning up dead. Guidry has good reason to expect he’ll be next because he was in Dallas on an errand for his boss just weeks before the assassination.
With few other options, Gudry decides hits the road for Las Vegas. He knows that the first rule of running is “don’t stop,” but when he sees a gorgeous housewife who has broken down on the side of the road with two kids and a dog he realizes that traveling with her could give him the perfect cover.
Charlotte is also desperate to escape her small-town Oklahoma life with a hopelessly drunk husband in hopes of creating a better life for her kids.
The Book Girls Say…
This novel brought home a long list of awards and nominations, including a nomination for Best Novel of the Decade.
The Other Side of Disappearing
Book Summary
A decade ago, hairstylist Jess Greene’s mother ran off with a man she barely knew. Since that time, Jess has been raising her younger half-sister, Tegan. Now 31 years old, Jess has also been keeping a secret all these years. She always known that her mother’s boyfriend is an accomplished con man that has since been featured as the subject of a popular podcast. But what Jess didn’t expect was for Tegan to figure that out for herself.
Now that Tegan knows, she plans to leave the safety of the home her sister has provided for her in search of their mother. She doesn’t plan to search alone, though. She’ll be accompanied by the prying podcaster and the podcaster’s handsome producer, Adam. Jess doesn’t want Tegan to go, but since she can’t stop her, she reluctantly agrees to go along.
As the four make their way across the country they work to unravel the mystery of where the couple went, and why. For the first time in a long time, Jess is discovering what it’s like to step outside the walls she built up around her. She’s surprised to feel a connection with Adam – something she didn’t even realize she was missing in her life.
The Book Girls Say…
Kate Clayborn is the author of the popular Georgie, All Along, although readers say this book is a heavier and shows Clayborn’s versatility as an author. While this book is categorized as mystery and romance, it also offers themes of the grief and healing, bonds of sisterhood, complex family dynamics, and self-discovery. It’s perfect for fans of true crime podcasts.
She’s Up to No Good
Book Summary
Jenna has been married for four years when her husband suddenly asks for a divorce. With new found time on her hands and everything in her life in flux, she agrees to accompany her eccentric grandmother on a roadtrip to visit the seaside town in Massachuesetts that shaped their family history.
As they drive, Evelyn tells Jenna a star-crossed tale of the teen romance that changed Evelyns life more than seven decades ago. While Evelyn insists that the trip back to her hometown has nothing to do with Tony, Jenna isn’t so sure.
Discovering the secrets and truths of her Evelyn’s past allows Jenna to discover a whole new side of her grandmother, and may also open her eyes to new possibiities for her future.
The Book Girls Say…
Our readers recently voted Sara Goodman Confino’s 2023 Don’t Forget to Write one of the “best beach reads of all time,” so we can’t wait to read this 2022 road trip read as well!
One Plus One
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Book Summary
Jess is in a terrible phase of life. Her husband disappeared, leaving not only her, but also his son Nicky behind. Plus, she’s short on cash, and her math whiz daughter has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to compete in the Math Olympiad in Scotland. The math contest comes with a cash prize, and it’s just what Jess needs to cover the 10% of her daughter’s tuition that isn’t covered by a scholarship.
When she gets an offer from a knight in shining armor to drive the family to the Math Olympiad, it’s the last person she expects. Geeky Ed is a tech millionaire. Jess only knows him because she cleans his house. While the last thing he needs is to be on a road trip with his house cleaner, her two quirky kids, and their flatulent dog Norman, Ed gets sucked into their story, and they all set off to Scotland.
The Book Girls Say…
One Plus One was nominated for the 2014 Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Fiction. While readers mention laughing out loud while reading this one, it also stays true to Jojo Moyes’s style of having more depth and emotion than many romance novels. You’ll feel deeply for Jess, especially if you’ve ever struggled financially. You might even need a few tissues!
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Book Summary
In 1998, twelve-year-old Lily Jorgenson’s family traveled from America to Australia and embarked on a yearlong road trip. But one night, during a storm, Lily’s mother disappeared in the Australian everglades and was never seen again.
That same night, her sister, Iris was also missing for hours. And when Iris finally returned to the family camper, she refused to tell Lily where she’d been. Lily suspects her sister is hiding a dark secret.
Twenty-four years later, Lily lives in Pennsylvania and works as a travel writer. When she receives word that flooding in the dredged up her mother’s backpack, she feels compelled to travel back to Australia to unlock the secrets of the past once and for all. But doing so may shatter everything she thought she knew about her family.
The Book Girls Say…
Thriller novelist Anni Taylor was born and raised in Sydney, Australia, and where she still gives with her partner and four sons.
Whistling Past the Graveyard
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Book Summary
Starla Claudelle, 9 years old
Starla is only 9 years old when she makes a series of decisions that change her life overnight. It’s 1963, and she lives with her strict grandmother in Mississippi. Despite being grounded, Starla sneaks out to see the annual 4th of July parade. When she’s caught, she believes her grandmother’s threats of reform school and sneaks out again with the intention of finding her mom all the way in Nashville.
Starla is offered a ride from a black woman, Eula, traveling with a white baby, quite the controversial scene in the 1963 South. Their road trip is full of adventures, sometimes dangerous, and the long chats along the way help Starla redefine family and better understand the world she lives in.
The Book Girls Say…
This book is described by many as The Secret Life of Bees meets The Help meets To Kill a Mockingbird.
Heads Up: This book does include some domestic violence.
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Book Summary
After Noelle’s beloved grandmother passes away she comes across a stash of old letters and photos that hint at a forbidden love in her gram’s past. Hoping to learn more, Noelle creates a TikTok video appealing for info.
When the video goes viral, she is able to track down her grandmother’s secret love, Paul. She learns that Paul had once planned to take her gram on a honeymoon roadtrip, but they never got the chance.
Now Noell has the opportunity to take the trip instead, but Paul insists that his grandson Theo also tag along. The problem is that Theo also happens to be Noell’s handsome high-school rival. Can she survive two weeks in a car with him?
The Book Girls Say…
Readers say this debut novel gives major 90s and 2000s rom com movie vibes, and what could be better than that?
Station Eleven
Book Summary
Station Eleven is set in a dystopian future during the collapse of civilization. It all begins one night when a famous Hollywood star dies onstage during a performance of King Lear. Soon, the world as we know it begins to dissolve. A nomadic group of actors, known as the Traveling Symphony, begin roaming between scattered outposts in the wasteland that remains of the Great Lakes Region.
The story moves back and forth between the early days of the Hollywood star to fifteen years in the future as the Traveling Symphony risks everything for art and humanity.
The publisher describes this book as follows: “This suspenseful, elegiac, spellbinding novel charts the strange twists of fate that connect five people: the actor, the man who tried to save him, the actor’s first wife, his oldest friend, and a young actress with the Traveling Symphony, caught in the crosshairs of a dangerous self-proclaimed prophet.”
The Book Girls Say…
This popular 2014 novel was adapted into an HBO Max series that ran for ten episodes in 2021 and 2022, however the series diverted from the book in many ways. Plotlines were changed significantly, as did the points in time and circumstances under which the characters met.
Jenny James Is Not a Disaster
Book Summary
Sometimes in life, the worst of times can lead to something good. But this was pretty hard to even imagine about for Jenny, whose week had turned into something that no one should have to bear all at once.
She’s a single mom who has just lost her job, her car won’t start, her son is a teenager with a teenage attitude, and it won’t stop raining…which makes her cottage literally fall off a cliff. And it’s not just her house that’s now gone…it’s all her possessions, including her son’s baby photos.
With nothing left, Jenny leaps into a new start as dramatic as her devastating week. She and her 18 year old son, Charlie, join their nomadic neighbor, Luke, and his dachshund, Betty, in his campervan on a road trip around England. As Jenny moves forward on this unexpected adventure, she’s reminded of long-forgotten dreams and her mind is free to begin dreaming about her future for the first time in a long time.
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Here We Go Again
Book Summary
Logan and Rosemary were childhood friends who spent their summers together running through the woods and rebelling against their conservative small town. But then something happened the summer before high school that turned them into bitter rivals. They then went 10 years after graduation without speaking.
Both women are now in their thirties but neither of them are living the lives they’d envisioned for themselves. Still in their home town and working as teachers at their alma matter, the two women are stuck in old patterns but for different reasons. Rosemary places security and stability above everything else, while Logan is impulsive but apathetic.
When their beloved English teacher mentor reveals that he only has a few months to live, the two women agree to fulfill his cross-country roadtrip request even though it means a whole summer together. As they travel in a van from Washington state to the Grand Canyon and from the Gulf Coast to Maine, the course they chart may just lead them back to one another.
The Book Girls Say…
This new queer friends-to-enemies-to-lovers open-door rom com is from the author of the popular Charm Offensive. While readers say this book has lots of laughts, they also warn to keep the tissues handy and be prepared for some serious sobbing as well.
Hadley & Grace
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Book Summary
Hadley needs to escape her physically abusive husband, Frank, to protect herself, her teenage daughter, and her special needs nephew. Grace is a new mother struggling with single-parenting while her husband is away. Hadley’s husband, Frank, has just cheated Grace out of her commission on a business deal.
One Friday night, these two women cross paths and form an alliance that sets the stage for a road trip adventure with major Thelma and Louise vibes (minus the violence). Together, Hadley and Grace, with three children in tow, are racing to stay one step ahead of the trouble that is chasing them – trouble in the form of Frank, the FBI, and the media. This is a humorous and adventurous feel-good story about two women trying to outsmart everyone to protect their families.
The Book Girls Say…
The characters depart from California and drive through the west, through deserts and small towns to big cities.
This Thelma & Louise-esque novel is good fun, but it also deals with heavier issues, like domestic abuse, gambling, and murder.
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The Bump
Book Summary
Wyatt and Biz are total opposites, but it’s always worked for their relationship. One is a practical TV commerical director, and the other a former child star who thrives on spontaneity.
They’ve wanted to become parents for as long as they can remember and now it’s finally happening. They are expecting a baby via surrogate… and they are freaking out!
They live in Brooklyn but the baby will be born in California. The plan was to fly out there before the birth, but they decide to instead spend their last few weeks before fatherhood on a road trip babymoon, enjoying some much needed “us-time.”
As the daddies-to-be make their way across the country in their 1992 Volkswagen Cabriolet they recharge at a beach in Provincetown, attend an impromptu baby shower in Chicago, and attend a Star Wars-themed wedding in Colorado.
But the road trip is not without a few bumps along the way. Unexpected detours open old wounds and reveal secrets that could change their relationship, for better or for worse.
The Book Girls Say…
Readers describe this novel as hilarious, heartwarming, and poignant. It’s a rom com with a heavy dose of family drama that is said to be perfect for fans of The Guncle.
Housemates
Book Summary
Leah placed an ad for a new roomate and Bernie answered. One is a writer and the other a photographer, and together they begin a friendship based on their mutual belief in the power of art.
When Bernie’s former photography professor passes away, leaving her a complicated inheritance, Leah agrees to accompany her on a road trip to rural Pennsylvania.
Together the women turn the short road trip into an three week artistic endeavor as they aim to document America through words and photos. Their journey into the heart of a politically divided state opens up conversations with people from all walks of life abou tthe dreams and failures of the country and helps them as they try to make sense of the times they are living in.
The Book Girls Say…
While this novel includes elements of romance between the housemates, readers say it does not fit into the romance genre.
The Summer Seekers
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
Book Summary
Kathleen is living independently at 80 years old, and she’s rather impressed with the way she handled a recent scary situation with an intruder. However, her daughter Liza thinks this incident is a prime example of why Kathleen should move to a senior home.
Not only does Kathleen not want to move, she’s also ready for a new adventure traveling down Route 66 in search of an old friend. Liza’s already stressed and has no time to drive across the country with her mom. So, Kathleen publishes an ad for a driver and companion to travel with her across America.
When 25-year-old Martha sees the ad, she thinks it could solve all her problems. How much trouble could an 80-year-old be?
The Book Girls Say…
This story is light and enjoyable – nothing overly dramatic or weighty. It’s just three women, at various stages of life, having the courage to reassess and take stock of their lives and make necessary changes. This work of contemporary fiction has a romance storyline as well.
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The Road Trip
Book Summary
Ex’s Addie and Dylan haven’t spoken in two years, but are both headed to their friend’s wedding in Scotland. When their cars crash into each other, they have no choice but to carpool if they want to make it to the wedding on time. In addition to Addie and Dylan, Dylan’s best friend, Addie’s sister, and a random guy from Facebook who needed a ride are cramped into a Mini for the long ride across England.
Along the way, Addie and Dylan are forced to explore the events that tore them apart.
The Book Girls Say…
Beth O’Leary stole our hearts with The Flatshare, her first book, and warmed our hearts again with The Road Trip.
The book features a “Now and Then” split timeline and is a bit more somber than some of the author’s first other books, while still incorporating some humor.
I Was Told It Would Get Easier
Book Summary
On a bus packed full of strangers (as well as two enemies), Jessica and Emily embark on a mother-daughter tour of East Coast colleges.
Though the trip is carefully mapped out, Jessica and Emily have very different ideas of how this college tour should go. Jessica is hoping to bond with the daugther she feels like she’s lost. But Emily sees the trip as a preview of the freedom she desires, even if she’s not really sure college is for her. But it doesn’t take long for this college roadtrip to devolve into a series of off-roading misadventures.
The Book Girls Say…
We adored Abbi Waxman’s The Overdue Life of Nina Hill so we can’t wait to read this mother-daughter road trip adventure.
Bonus Non-Fiction Books About Road Trips
Harry Truman’s Excellent Adventure
Book Summary
Just a few months after leaving office, Harry Truman and his wife, Bess, did something unprecedented for a former President. They hopped in their new ’53 Chrysler New Yorker and started a three-week, 2500-mile road trip from their home in Independence, Missouri to Washington, DC, with a stop in New York City for their anniversary. They wanted to fly under the radar – no press, no Secret Service, just a newly retired couple.
Of course, America didn’t cooperate, and their cover was blown time and again by bellhops, cabbies, teenagers, and even a Pennsylvania state trooper. While he left office with a 22% approval rating, he was still greeted with respect and adoration all along the way.
The Book Girls Say…
The book shows Truman’s experiences in the context of the 40s-50s, but the author also retraced the journey, staying in the same hotels and eating at the same restaurants, so you get both the historical journey and a more contemporary road trip as you read.
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Driving Miss Norma
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
Book Summary
This nonfiction book is part family memoir and part travelog. Norma had recently lost her husband of nearly seven decades when she was diagnosed with uterine cancer. The medical advice included surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. But she had a different vision for her waning days. Rather than spending them in a hospital bed, Norma wants an adventure.
Together with her retired son, Tim, his wife, Ramie, and their Poodle named Ringo, Norma hits the road in a motorhome, determined to see as much as possible. A once timid woman, Norma decides to say “yes” to living. State by state, she tries regional foods for the first time, goes whale watching and hot air ballooning, and mounts up for a horseback ride. With each passing mile (and thanks in part to a stop at a cannabis dispensary), Norma’s health improves, and she and her family form a tighter bond.
The Book Girls Say…
Ramie created a Facebook page called “Driving Miss Norma” to document the family’s journey. As their following grew, strangers all around the country began recommending places to stop and things to do, which helped to guide their 32-state journey. Our readers call this an uplifting, inspirational, and moving story!
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Books With Characters in Their 90s and 100s
Books About Traveling Across America
Join the Summer Reading Challenge
Our free self-paced reading challenge will keep you reading engaging books all summer long. To make it easy and fun, we include highly-rated book recommendations for each of the six summer reading prompts.
More Book Recommendations
Summer and road trips go hand in hand! If you are looking for more excellent summer time reads, we have lots of recommendations across a wide variety of genres:
- Best Audiobooks for Road Trips
- Book Club Books for Summer 2024
- The Best Books About Road Trips
- Books to Read Before the Summer Olympics
- Summer Reading Challenge for Adults
- Best Beach Reads of All Time According to Our Readers
- What Makes a Good Beach Read?
- 13 Great Books About Swimmers
- Summer Mystery Books & Beach Thrillers
- Summertime Reads for Historical Fiction Fans
- Summer Cozy Mysteries Set on the Beach
- Summer Books to Read on the Beach in 2024
- Best Summer Reads from 2023
- Books Set on Lakes and at Lake Houses
- Mysterious Thriller Books Set on Islands
Heading out on a roadtrip of your own? Check out our list of the best audiobooks to listen to on road trips with adults and the best audiobooks for family road trips with kids.
