What to Read on a Train: Fast Books for Fast Trains, Slow Books for Slow Ones

I have a reading habit that sounds a little silly, so stay with me: I like to read something that feels like the motion of the train. If I’m on a high-speed train, I want a book that moves just as fast, with some action and a little bit of mystery, and if I’m on a slow train that stops at every village with a platform and a flower box, I want something slow and quiet that lets me sink all the way in. Matching the book to the train has made me a much happier reader, and I think it might do the same for you.

I should also be honest with you, delighters: I have never done a ten-hour train ride. The longest I’ve done is about eight hours, on the trip where I took trains all the way from Edinburgh to the south of Spain and broke it into legs because I was tired of flying. So this isn’t a survival guide for one heroic day on the rails. It’s a reading guide for any train, fast or slow, with a few books I’d hand you for each.

Why the speed of the train should pick your book

A train has a rhythm, and your reading picks it up whether you mean it to or not. On a fast train, the landscape flashes past too quickly to really watch, the stops are few and the whole carriage hums with the feeling of getting somewhere, so a book with short chapters, a ticking clock and a question you need answered fits right into that feeling.

On a slow train, the window is the main event. You want a book you can set down for ten minutes to watch a river go by, then pick up again without losing the thread, and that is exactly what slow, interior novels are made for, since the action happens inside the characters rather than around them.

Read fast on a fast train and slow on a slow one, and let the book and the window keep the same time.

Fast trains, fast books

High-speed trains like the Eurostar, France’s TGV, Spain’s AVE and Italy’s Frecciarossa are made for propulsive books: mysteries, thrillers and speculative fiction with a hook in the very first chapter. I read The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley on a speed train, and it’s the perfect example of what I mean, a book that is a time-travel romance, a spy thriller and a comedy all at once, with a plot that never sits still. Here are a few more I’d pack for a fast train.

• The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley. A civil servant is assigned to help a Victorian polar explorer adjust to modern London, and what starts as an odd-couple comedy turns into a romance and a genuinely tense thriller. (This is the one I read on a speed train.)
• My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite. A nurse in Lagos keeps cleaning up after her beautiful younger sister, whose boyfriends keep ending up dead. It’s short, sharp and darkly funny, and you can finish it between two capitals.
• The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris. The only Black editorial assistant at a New York publishing house is thrilled when another Black woman joins the office, right up until anonymous notes start telling her to leave. It’s a workplace satire that slowly becomes a thriller.
• When No One Is Watching by Alyssa Cole. A Brooklyn woman notices her neighbors quietly disappearing as her block gentrifies, and what looks like an ordinary story about a changing neighborhood turns into something much more sinister.
• Kindred by Octavia E. Butler. A Black writer in 1976 Los Angeles is pulled back in time, again and again, to a plantation in antebellum Maryland. It’s speculative fiction at its most urgent, and you won’t want to look up at any station.

Slow trains, slow books

Regional and scenic lines are a different animal entirely. These are the trains that wander through the countryside and stop at villages so small that the platform is basically someone’s garden, and on trains like that, I like to read slowly, too. I usually reach for Anne Tyler or Toni Morrison, two writers who can make a kitchen table or a front porch feel as big as the world. These are the books I’d suggest for a slow train.

• Anne Tyler. Try Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant or Breathing Lessons, two quiet Baltimore family novels in which very little happens on the surface and absolutely everything happens underneath.
• Toni Morrison. Sula is short enough for one long afternoon and deep enough to think about for a year, while Song of Solomon is perfect for a trip with more than one leg.
• Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. Janie Crawford tells her life story to her best friend on a porch in Florida, and it’s one of the great novels about a woman learning who she is.
• Maud Martha by Gwendolyn Brooks. Brooks’s only novel is a string of small, luminous scenes from a Black woman’s life in Chicago, which makes it perfect for reading a chapter, looking out the window and then reading another.
• The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri. This family story follows a Bengali couple in Massachusetts and the son they name after a Russian writer across several decades, told with a calm that matches a slow window beautifully.

What if your trip has both?

Plenty of journeys mix the two, with a high-speed leg between big cities and then a sleepy regional train to wherever you actually want to be, so pack one of each and let the train decide. A short story collection is a lovely in-between option, too, since a single story fits neatly between two stops. I’m working my way through The Best American Short Stories series, and those volumes are perfect for this.

A few train reading tips

Check the train before you choose the book. Look at the route, the number of stops and the scenery, and pack accordingly, because a thriller on a sleepy branch line can feel like reading in the wrong key.

Bring a backup. If the book isn’t working, there’s no shame in abandoning it at the next station (metaphorically, please).

Bring a notebook. Train windows produce thoughts, and a slow train especially will hand you a few you’ll want to keep.

Leave room for the window. Whatever you’re reading, sometimes the best thing to do on a train is close the book and look.

If you’re convinced, here’s why train travel is the most relaxing way to see the world, plus what to pack. And for a route with a spectacular view, read about the window seat from Edinburgh to London.