I started the Thoughtful Travellers Book Club in January 2020 to help both me and my fellow thoughtful travellers read more great travel narratives. You can join in through the Thoughtful Travellers Facebook group – my co-host Justin and I read and chat about a new travel book about every two months, and you can contribute your thoughts and questions live. Wherever possible, we try to include the author of the book too, which makes it a hundred times more fun! You can read about upcoming books below, and further down the page are past book club features, including the great discussions we’ve had about the books we’ve read together. To make extra sure you see the next announcements, sign up to our mailing list here – I only send emails with book club details, so about one a month or so.
2026 Book Club choices
February 2026: Our first read for the year is Hannah Kent’s memoir Always Home, Always Homesick about her experiences with one of our favourite places, Iceland. Book club is taking place on 27th February.
2025 Book Club choices
The Thoughtful Travellers Book Club made a grand return back after our 2024 hiatus, and we had a lot of fun.
December 2025: We rounded off the year with a chat about Eric Weiner’s Geography of Bliss, a book that we had mixed feelings about (can’t love them all!).
October 2025: After many years of loving all her train travel stories, we were thrilled to have Monisha Rajesh on to chat with us about her new book Moonlight Express (audio version here).
August 2025: We all love Japan: discussing Chris Broad’s brilliant Abroad in Japan for our August 2025 book club session was so much fun.
In June 2025, we chatted with British journalist Ash Bhardwaj about his book Why We Travel.
2023 Book Club choices
March 2023: I was really curious to read this one because I’ve never really understood (from down here in Australia) the brand of Rick Steves, so I did feel enlightened by reading his book Travel as a Political Act. We had a good chat about what we (as Aussies) liked and what we didn’t. Click through here to listen to our chat about Travel as a Political Act.
August 2023: Another book from one of my very favourite memoir writers, Raynor Winn – this time, it’s Landlines, another long walk starting from Scotland. A pure pleasure! Click through here to listen to our chat about Landlines.
2022 Book Club choices
March 2022: After a narrow victory in a vote in our Facebook group, our first 2022 book was Charmian Clift’s Peel Me A Lotus and it was an interesting read to take us back to 1950s Greece. Click through here to listen to our chat about Peel Me A Lotus.
October 2022: After adoring her first book I was excited to share Raynor Winn’s second book The Wild Silence as a book club read. It did not disappoint! Click through here to listen to our chat about The Wild Silence.
2021 Thoughtful Travellers Book Club books
February 2021: Our first book for 2021 was Turn Right at Machu Picchu by Mark Adams. It’s a great read – a combo of historically enlightening and also fun and entertaining. Click through here to listen to our chat about Turn Right at Machu Picchu.
April 2021: I think I was the only traveller in the world who hadn’t read Cheryl Strayed’s Wild. I didn’t love it, but we had a good discussion! Click through here to listen to our chat about Wild.
June 2021: We took a vote in the Thoughtful Travellers group about which of Stephan Orth’s books to read, and by a relatively narrow margin the winner was Couchsurfing in Iran. I’ve since read several more of his Couchsurfing books and enjoyed them all. Click through here to listen to our chat about Couchsurfing in Iran.
August 2021: I stumbled across Mary Morris’s new book All the Way to the Tigers at pretty much the exact same time my friend sent me a great book edited by Mary Morris, The Virago Book of Women Travellers. I fell in love with All the Way to the Tigers, and the paperback was released just in time to make it our July/August 2021 book, and even better, we were able to get Mary onto a call with us for our book club session. Click through here to listen to our chat about All the Way to the Tigers.
October 2021: I love Pico Iyer’s writing, and I love Japan, so his new book A Beginner’s Guide to Japan was an obvious choice to be the focus of our October book club discussion. Click through here to listen to our chat about A Beginner’s Guide to Japan.
December 2021: I have a bit of an obsession with “the Stans” – despite not having travelled to any of them, yet (thanks, Covid) – but that’s one of the reasons behind this pick, Sovietistan, by Norwegian author Erika Fatland. Click through here to listen to our chat about Sovietistan.
Postponed*: I always like to throw in a more classic travel book now and again and a friend recommended Alexandra David-Neel’s My Journey to Lhasa, which we’ll discuss around late July/early August.
*Quite a few people – including, importantly, me! – have been unable to get a copy – the one I’d bought was cancelled and the price refunded – so we are putting this one on hold until supplies work out!
2020 Thoughtful Travellers Book Club books
January 2020: We started with a modern classic: Alain de Botton’s The Art of Travel. I read this quite some years ago and had been wanting to re-read it for ages! Click through here to listen to our book club discussion about The Art of Travel.
February 2020: One of my all time travel-related books: Helen Russell’s The Year of Living Danishly. I read it prior to my trip to Denmark a couple of years back and it enhanced my trip so much – it’s a fascinating insight into a quite unique country and its culture. Click through here to listen to our discussion on The Year of Living Danishly.
April 2020: To coincide with The Thoughtful Travel Podcast’s fourth birthday I picked the new book about Mexico by Paul Theroux, On the Plain of Snakes, as he’s partly responsible for me becoming obsessed with travel. Click through here to listen to our chat about On the Plain of Snakes.
May 2020: One of my very favourite ways to travel is by train, and Monisha Rajesh’s second book Around the World in 80 Trains: A 45,000-Mile Adventure was a fabulous read. Click through here to listen to our chat about Around the World in 80 Trains.
June 2020: Time for a classic with Eric Newby’s 1958 book A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush. What an adventure! Click through here to listen to our discussion of A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush.
July 2020: My favourite book for 2020 was Raynor Winn’s The Salt Path, suggested by a fabulous listener. (My other favourite book for 2020 was her second book, The Wild Silence.) Click here to hear our chat about The Salt Path.
September 2020: The autobiography of TV journalist Simon Reeve, Step by Step, covered his journeys through all kinds of adventurous places with a good dose of what he’s learnt from his travels, too. Click through here for our discussion of Step by Step.
November 2020: One of my very favourite travel writers is Bill Bryson, and of his many great books I just love Down Under (or In A Sunburned Country, depending on the edition), because it’s so interesting to read his perspective on my home country. Click through here for our chat about Down Under.
January 2021: Our final read for 2020 – discussed in early 2021 – was Bewildered by Laura Waters, about her five-month long journey hiking from the north to the south of New Zealand. It was a special book club because we were joined by Laura herself! Click through here to listen to our discussion about Bewildered with Laura Waters.
NotABallerina.com is participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program linked to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. Some of the links on this page are affiliate links, which means we may get compensated at no extra cost to you if you make a purchase through a link.