Top 12 Places in Novels that Will Trigger Your Wanderlust
Duomo, Florence, Italy (Photo by Cindy Fazzi)
Can’t travel this summer? No problem. A good book can transport us to another city or country and to places we can only dream of visiting. Even when a story is sad or downright depressing, a memorable depiction of a locale can still trigger our wanderlust.
Though I’ve never been to France, in James Salter’s capable hands, I can almost see the French countryside as “long, wheat-colored stretches and then green, level land, recumbent and rich.”
I visited Florence partly because of E.M. Forster and writing such as this: “It was pleasant, too, to fling wide the windows…to lean out into sunshine with beautiful hills and trees and marble churches opposite, and, close below, Arno, gurgling against the embankment of the road.”
Tower Bridge in London (Photo by Cindy Fazzi).
Top 12 Places in Novels
Some of these books are incredible in describing locale and ambience. Others are better at evoking a certain mood (“The Maltese Falcon” and “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”) and a certain time (“The Age of Innocence” and “The Great Gatsby”). All in all, these books are memorable and so are the places they depict.
#1 Florence and Tuscany: “A Room with a View” by E.M. Forster
#2 France: “A Sport and a Pastime” by James Salter
#3 English Countryside: “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen
#4 Santa Ynez Valley, California: “Sideways” by Rex Pickett
#5 New York City: “The Age of Innocence” by Edith Wharton
#6 Long Island, New York: “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald
#7 San Francisco: “The Maltese Falcon” by Dashiell Hammett
#8 London: “High Fidelity” by Nick Hornby
#9 Chicago: (Old Chicago) “Sister Carrie” by Theodore Dreiser; (Contemporary Chicago) “Presumed Innocent” by Scott Turow
#10 Stockholm: “The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson
#11 Cinque Terre, Italy: Fictionalized as Porto Vergogna in “Beautiful Ruins” by Jess Walter
#12 Tangier, Morocco: “Tangerine” by Christine Mangan
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