BootsnAll Travel Community

I'm interested in great book suggestions- the kind that make a 14 hour flight across the ocean fly by. I'm planning to back pack for three months around Europe, taking ryanair a couple of times and of course trains, so I'll need a couple of really good, paperback books to take along.

Any suggestions?

Certainly! Start here.

That forum seems to be mostly books about traveling, and some of them you can finish in an hour or two! On planes I like well written novels that I can completely immerse myself in, and books that are long enough that I won't finish them before I land. If a country has a "national epic" then I'll usually pick that (so, Maguib's Palace Walk for Egypt, or Toer's This Earth of Mankind for Indonesia, and if I ever go to Iceland I'll reread Independent People for sure, etc.

Some recent classics that I think would be great for planes:
Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
Shadow of the Wind, Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Suite Française, Irene Némirovsky

happyhiker, given that I know you so well.... .... I am certain that this book is the one you need to bring.

Once you get over the Chabon's "I'm going to impress you with my writing skills...." schtick, it's impossible to put down. And it's poperly thick.

Thanks, Michael C.- Great choices! I saw Suite Francaise in the bookstore the other day and almost bought it. Now I think I'll save it for the plane ride to Europe. I should have clarified that I was talking about just general fiction/non-fiction books and not travel books.

Not the First Travis: Your suggestion made me laugh! After reading a review on Amazon for it, I'm intrigued and might pick it up.

Some of my suggestions for books I could not put down:
1. Animal, Vegetable, Mineral by Kingsolver
2. The Handmaid's Tale by Atwood
3. The Great Train Robbery by Crichton
4. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Marquez

I read really fast. So long plane rides...I need something really long.

Ones I'd recommend

Of Human Bondage -- Maughm
Don Quixote -- Cervantes
War and Peace -- Tolstoy
Lady Chatterly's Lover; The Rainbow -- Lawrence

Future travel plans include reading Les Mis and Rebecca West's travelogue of Eastern Europe!

ayn rand 'atlas shrugged' .. super long! it took me two round trip flights to get through half of it.. still not done.

I'm reading Nicholas Nickelby as my ttravel book- an oldy but goody bought to you by the same guy who wrote a christmas carol

Personally I'd like to choose some interesting story books, or some comic books.

The Stand, Stephen King.--One of his earlier books but is not gory. Some of the best character development I have ever read. And this book is thick!
Welcome to Temptation, Jennifer Crusie-- Funny. Sexy. She makes me laugh out loud
The 'In Death' Series by JD Robb: Naked in Death is the first. Glory In Death is the second. Goes from there
The Princess Bride, William Goldman --Book is better than the movie.

Herodotus 'The Histories'

Not everyone's scene.. but one of the ultimate travel reads.