The Best Books for Your 2024 Finger Lakes Vacation

There’s nothing better than taking a good book along with you when you travel and if you’re planning on visiting the Finger Lakes in 2024, we’ve got a few recommendations on what you can take with you! Here are some of our favorite recent reads. 

If you love solving puzzles…The Maid by Nina Prose is the cozy mystery you’ve been looking for. Molly Gray is not like everyone else. She struggles with social skills and misreads the intentions of others. Her grandmother used to interpret the world for her, codifying it into simple rules that Molly could live by. Since Gran died a few months ago, twenty-five-year-old Molly has been navigating life’s complexities all by herself and throws herself with gusto into her work as a hotel maid. But Molly’s orderly life is upended the day she enters the suite of the infamous and wealthy Charles Black, only to find it in a state of disarray and Mr. Black himself dead in his bed. Before she knows what’s happening, Molly’s unusual demeanor has the police targeting her as their lead suspect. She quickly finds herself caught in a web of deception, one she has no idea how to untangle.

If you love stories of family…Tom Lake by Ann Patchet is the perfect pick, as well as a selection in Reese’s Book Club. In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.

If you crave a little magic… Witch of Wild Things by Raquel Vasquez Gilliland will have you enchanted. This book follows Sage Flores who has been running from her family—and their magical gifts—ever since her younger sister Sky died. Eight years later, Sage reluctantly returns to her hometown. Like slipping into an old, comforting sweater, Sage takes back her job at Cranberry Rose Company and uses her ability to communicate with plants to discover unusual heritage specimens in the surrounding lands. What should be a simple task is complicated by her partner in botany sleuthing: Tennessee Reyes. He broke her heart in high school, and she never fully recovered. Working together is reminding her of all their past tender, genuine moments—and new feelings are starting to take root in her heart.

If you want a good laugh…Quietly Hostile by Samantha Irby will leave you in stitches! In this collection of essays, we explore how Samantha Irby’s career has taken her to new heights. She dodges calls from Hollywood and flop sweats on the red carpet at premieres (well, one premiere). But nothing is ever as it seems online, where she can crop out all the ugly parts. Quietly Hostile takes us on another outrageously funny tour of all the gory details that make up the true portrait of a life behind the screenshotted depression memes. Billed as relatable, poignant, and uproarious (and we agree!).

If you enjoy learning something new…The Art Thief by Michael Finkel is the perfect mix of true crime, art history, and psychology. For centuries, works of art have been stolen in countless ways from all over the world, but no one has been quite as successful at it as the master thief Stéphane Breitwieser. Carrying out more than two hundred heists over nearly eight years--in museums and cathedrals all over Europe--Breitwieser, along with his girlfriend who worked as his lookout, stole more than three hundred objects, until it all fell apart in spectacular fashion.

Ready to read? We recommend cozying up by one of our outdoor fire pits or tucked away in our amazingly comfortable vacation properties. Before you start turning pages, pour a glass of wine from one of our local vineyards (we have plenty of recommendations when you book with us!) or make a little something from our coffee and tea stations. Complimentary locally roasted organic beans from Seneca Sunrise Coffee and organic tea are both waiting for you when you check in :) There’s just something about sinking into a great story that makes any vacation stay even sweeter!