Travel to read: Book-cations and readaways are the new thing

In the book People We Meet On Vacation by Emily Henry, the protagonists take a series of trips, including a pivotal one to Croatia.

This summer, travel company EF Ultimate Break will offer a 12-day trip to Croatia based on the book. Part of a new BookTok-inspired series of trips, the itinerary shadows the plot with visits to Dubrovnik and Split and adds a cruise among Croatian islands, amplifying the romance of a beachy destination that oozes history.

“You can imagine following along with the story,” said Alyssa Sands, director of market development for the company.

Never mind The White Lotus (2021 to present).

On the heels of “set-jetting” comes “book-cations” – trips that visit a locale of a favourite book, a place where an author lived or simply where the conditions are conducive to reading.

In its 2026 travel trends report, flight-tracking site Skyscanner found that 55 per cent of travellers had booked a trip or would consider one inspired by a book.

The vacation rental platform Vrbo coined the term “readaways” or book-inspired group travel, in its trend report, noting that 91 per cent of respondents registered interest in a trip devoted to reading and relaxing.

Resort book clubs, hotel libraries and a growing number of literary festivals are also offering readers new ways to indulge their interests. This comes despite a recent finding that the share of people who read for pleasure has dropped 40 per cent since 2003.

It helps that vacations often grant time to read.

“It’s about shutting off the computer and the phone, and calming yourself down,” said Jane Ubell-Meyer, founder of Bedside Reading, a service that teams up with hotels to offer complimentary access to a digital library of more than 200 titles. “I think a book helps you with that.”

Bookish travel is not new – think of the legions of visitors to Pamplona, Spain, inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises; the Janeites who visited England in 2025 to celebrate Jane Austen’s 250th birthday; or those trekking there in 2026 for the centenary of Winnie-the-Pooh’s birth.

“A book can give you the significance of a place that a guidebook or travel article won’t,” said Amy Alipio, a founding member of The Travel Book Club, a Substack-based reading circle.

Book trips offer a new way to see something familiar.

“Literature gives us a purpose,” said Renee Haight of Phoenix, Arizona, who has travelled to New York and plans to visit England with Novel Travels, a company which organises literary journeys. “I’m 84 years old and I’ve seen enough old buildings.”

Sometimes, a good book can make you nostalgic for a place you have never seen.

“Books open doors to other worlds,” said Sarah Moriarty, director of the Charleston Literary Festival in Charleston, South Carolina. “It’s not a huge surprise that many would take the leap to travel with their feet.”

When they do, the following travel companies help bring the pages to life, or at least create the ideal reading conditions.

Hotels with reading habits

Many hotels, such as The Plaza in New York, home to Eloise and a scene in The Great Gatsby, are associated with books. Others, like The Betsy South Beach in Miami, which hosts writers-in-residence, champion them.

More hotels are jumping on the literary bandwagon. In June, Avani Hotels & Resorts started a book club at its 44 properties, including on-site book corners where guests can borrow books that reflect the destination (such as The Miniaturist at the Avani in Amsterdam), a website listing titles by location and author events.

Several of these programmes aim to unite guests through a love of reading. The book club at Scribner’s Catskill Lodge in Hunter, New York, selects a book each quarter and invites readers to stay at the lodge to meet the author.

In the Maldives, the InterContinental Maldives Maamunagau Resort names a book of the month that guests can borrow, designed to stimulate conversation.

New three-night reading retreats at Lake Austin Spa Resort in Austin, Texas, alternate reading time with yoga and mindfulness sessions and author meet-and-greets.

Many hotels offer surprise titles. Guests who sign up for the “literary sabbatical” package at The Williams Inn in the Berkshires region of Massachusetts will find books in their room, selected by a local bookstore and based on their preferences.

“People aren’t just travelling to stories. They’re travelling into the conditions where they can actually read again,” said Ubell-Meyer of Bedside Reading, which offers access to books in more than 60 hotels nationwide in the US.

Literary trips

The boom in bookish trips ranges from day trips to week-long vacations.

In autumn 2025, the Nickel Plate Express, a heritage railway in Noblesville, Indiana, started Read and Rides: two-hour excursions that invite bookworms to read while enjoying the rural Indiana scenery. Expect the ride to be library-quiet in a pair of 68-seat cars.

The England-based Ladies Who Lit acts like a travelling book club. Instead of a gathering at a member’s house, the club might assemble 12 to 14 readers over five nights in Barbados or the Swiss Alps with a book discussion on the final night.

While Ladies Who Lit books are chosen for fostering conversation, other tours take a literal approach to a place.

Timbuktu Travel offers custom itineraries in South Africa, based on Long Walk To Freedom by Nelson Mandela, and in India, related to Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert.

“The author is usually asking you to sit with a place rather than rush past it,” said Johnny Prince, the co-founder and chief executive. “The clients we see choosing book-led trips are opting out of the highlights reel and into something a little more considered.”

Two years ago, Novel Travels began running tours in New York tied to the historical fiction of Fiona Davis, whose novels, including The Lions Of Fifth Avenue, are often based on New York buildings.

Most trips are capped at 14 readers and include book discussions, sightseeing and author chats.

A 2027 departure to Egypt features a pre-trip reading list that includes Agatha Christie’s Death On The Nile, Marie Benedict’s Daughter Of Egypt and Davis’ The Stolen Queen.

The titles are united in discussion by the question: Whose history survives?

“Travel becomes more meaningful when you already feel something for that destination, which books give you,” said Corinne Levine, founder of Novel Travels. NYTIMES