These 5 must-read travel books will fuel your wanderlust.

1. Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon

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“William Least Heat-Moon set out with little more than the need to put home behind him and a sense of curiosity about ‘those little towns that get on the map — if they get on at all — only because some cartographer has a blank space to fill: Remote, Oregon; Simplicity, Virginia; New Freedom, Pennsylvania; New Hope, Tennessee; Why, Arizona; Whynot, Mississippi.’

“His adventures, his discoveries, and his recollections of the extraordinary people he encountered along the way amount to a revelation of the true American experience.”

2. Midnight in Siberia by David Greene

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“Midnight in Siberia is a lively travel narrative filled with humor, adventure, and insight. It opens a window onto that country’s complicated relationship with democracy and offers a rare look into the soul of twenty-first-century Russia.”

3. Postcards from the Borderlands by David H. Mould

“What are borders? Are they simply political and geographical, marked by posts, walls and fences, or should we think of them more broadly? In his third book on travel, history and culture, college professor, historian and journalist David Mould rambles through a dozen countries in Asia and southern Africa by car, bus, train, shared taxi and ferry, exploring what borders mean to their peoples.

“Many countries are the artificial creations of colonial powers. Their borders, set by surveys and treaties, took no account of topography or the ethnic groups that were cobbled together. There are also borders within countries, defined by race, ethnicity, or caste. Borders may be physical and economic, even perceptual—the borders of our minds.

“On his travels, David faces shakedowns by border guards, finds old-time religion in Malawi, revisits the legacy of apartheid in Johannesburg, traverses the rivers of Bangladesh, wanders through the ancient kingdoms of Nepal, explores Malaysia’s troubled colonial past, sets off security alarms in Karachi, counts yaks and discovers dinosaurs on the Mongolian steppe, savors the cuisine of Georgia and fulfills a Dr. Zhivago fantasy on the Trans-Siberian Railway.”

4. The Lost Heart of Asia by Colin Thubron

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“In The Lost Heart of Asia, acclaimed, bestselling travel writer Colin Thubron carries readers on an extraordinary journey through this little understood, rarely visited, yet increasingly important corner of the world.”

5. Ten Years a Nomad: A Traveler’s Journey Home by Matthew Kepnes

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“Ten Years a Nomad is for travel junkies, the travel-curious, and anyone interested in what you can learn about the world when you don’t have a cable bill for a decade or spend a month not wearing shoes living on the beach in Thailand.”

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