Top Books to Read while travelling (especially if you want people to stare at you strangely)

Travel Books & Travel Writers.  The boom in Travel Blogging and the internet has dramatically increased the number of people putting out books and travel stories.  I know it is very 1990’s to travel with an actual BOOK these days, so lets just include eBooks into the category now as well.  With so many travel books it can make it tough separate the wheat from the chaff.

When I travel along with all the serious educational and literary masterpieces I love nothing more than a good laugh and particularly travel humour.  Anyone who has travelled even a day away from their home town knows that not everything goes right – in fact, in my mind travel only gets fun when stuff starts going wrong.

Find a nice quiet place to enjoy this read – otherwise you may make people feel a bit awkward with your uncontrolled laughter.

I first stumbled across Brian Thacker’s writings when we were on our Honeymoon in 2005.  All respect to Brian but I am pretty sure it was because it was the cheapest book in the airport bookshop and I was desperate for a read.  The book was The Naked Man Festival and other excuses to fly around the world (2004).  As with everything in life my wife commandeered the book and started reading it first.

If you have never come across Brian Thacker before he is a former tour leader who has a sharp wit and a very clever sense of humour.  This is a big warning though: Beware reading this book on public transport of any kind – people will think you are suffering from a serious illness! My poor wife couldn’t contain herself and was laughing out loud at virtually every page.

In this novel Brian travels to various festivals around the world including – the Tokyo Bean Throwing Festival, Sydney Mardi Gras, and the UFO Festival in Roswell, New Mexico.  The writing is very honest and has a great deal of humour thrown in for good measure:

…oh, the joys of dorm accommodation.  At four-thirty in the morning I awoke to the sound of someone humming in my ear.  The shaven-headed fellow from the best opposite me was sitting cross-legged on the bedside table right next to my head doing some sort of meditation thing.

The other scary thing however – it seems the more I travel the more these stories stop being funny – because versions of some of them have happed to us over the years….

If you are looking for a great read while travelling (or sitting on the couch at home), you can’t go wrong with Brian Thacker.

Not many books that I can say I look forward to re-reading. Pick any of Brian’s other books they are all full of his “wisdom”

Other books by Brian:

• I’m Not Eating Any Of That Foreign Muck
• Rule No. 5: No Sex on the Bus
• Planes, Trains and Elephants
• Where’s Wallis?
• Sleeping Around
• Tell Them to Get Lost

Check out his FB page here to see his latest ramblings.

What is your pick for the best book to read while travelling?  Let me know in the comments below – also where do you fall on the whole eBook vs. “real” book argument????