Imagine this: you’re all alone on a one-lane highway, the only car on the road. Heat is radiating off the asphalt in a shimmer that muddles the horizon. There’s no one to talk to but yourself.
This feeling isn’t quite loneliness; it’s just the meditative feeling that invades your brain as you become part of the vast desert landscape.
I recently asked myself: why do all mood reading guides focus on cozy books? Don’t get me wrong. I love a cozy book as much as the next person. But there are so many other moods out there that deserve their own guides!
This post is the result of going down that rabbit hole and is the first of what I hope will be many Mood Guides. This one is devoted to books that feel like a long drive alone in the desert. Growing up in the high desert myself (though far from this environment in my current tropical location), my soul often finds itself wandering to that vast, empty space that was filled both with a sense of longing and with a sense of expansiveness.
I’ve attempted to capture that feeling in this post!
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This was the first book I included on the list, because it is essentially this mood in book format. Written while he worked as a ranger at Arches National Park in Utah, he reflects on the tension between preserving nature and human development. Having grown up in this part of the world, his drive to preserve the natural beauty of the vast western United States particularly resonates with me.
A book that’s been on my TBR for a long time, The Sheltering Sky tells the story of 3 Americans who go traveling to the Sahara Desert. Along the way, the cruelty of the desert destroys them in ways they couldn’t have imagined. This book is a reminder that the desert is not always a kind, gentle place. Neither is the soul.
If you’ve been reading my posts for any amount of time, you’ll know that I love a good family saga. This one tracks the lives of 5 generations of an Indigenous Chicano family living in the desert Southwest of the United States. Centered around the story of Luz, the book deals with the outside forces that have shaped her family’s fate (and land) for generations. The touch of magical realism makes it the perfect fit for a desert list.
Wild is Strayed’s memoir of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail alone. Yes, she hikes through the desert in a stretch, and this is cited by reviewers as the soul of the book. But the reason I included it is not because part of it takes place in the desert. Instead, I chose this because, for me, the desert is where I go to think and reflect on life. Wild is not a hiking guide. It’s a memoir about taking a lonely trip and unpacking who you are along the way.
Vegas and the freeway have never felt more like a state of mind than they do in Didion’s hands. Play It As It Lays is sparse and brutal, just like the desert landscape. If you’ve never read Didion’s work, take this as a sign that you need to ASAP!
(book / audiobook)
Monks in a desert monastery, centuries after the end of the world, preserve scraps of history they don’t have the capacity to understand. This is one of the stranger picks on the list, but there is something about the desert setting and watching millennia of time pass by that fits the mood perfectly, if you ask me! This is also one of the books on my shelf of honor.
Note: If you do read this, know that it’s going to reward patience. You might not like it for a good part of the book, but after you finish (and after you find yourself thinking about this book constantly in the weeks and months after you read it), it just might become one of your favorites.
A 2026 release, Crux tells the story of two teenagers in the southern Mojave Desert who bond over rock climbing in trash-strewn parking lots on cold desert nights. As the year goes on, differences between the two begin to pull their lives in opposite directions, straining their bond. This novel is on my TBR, but Goodreads describes it as a “soul-searching novel about risking everything to change your life.” There is nothing more on mood than that.
Also, I’m putting this on the list for prettiest covers of 2026…
This unusual book tells the story of Sonny, a young woman who has recently come into a large sum of money and who takes herself on a luxury vacation to an exclusive Arizona resort. She’s a woman who is much more comfortable observing than participating, and this leads to a really interesting twist in the novel. The interiority and loneliness that mark such a large part of the book make it perfect for this list.
Here’s the thing about a long drive in a barren landscape. There are thoughts you can only hear once the noise stops, and the vastness of the desert is where noise simply ends.
Pick up one of these books when that sparseness calls to you, and you need to escape into a big, empty landscape where your thoughts are free to roam.
By the way, this is part of a new series, all books based on a mood rather than a more concrete theme. Check back in September for the next installment (if you guys liked this concept)!
But now I want to hear from you. Have you ever felt this feeling? What mood would you like to see books for?
Note: these recommendations are a mix of books I have read and ones I have researched. If you want further clarification, don’t hesitate to get in touch!
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