{"id":168469,"date":"2025-04-02T15:42:10","date_gmt":"2025-04-02T15:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/entertainment\/books\/12-recommended-reads-for-those-traveling-to-washington-d-c-modern-mrs-darcy\/"},"modified":"2025-04-02T15:42:10","modified_gmt":"2025-04-02T15:42:10","slug":"12-recommended-reads-for-those-traveling-to-washington-d-c-modern-mrs-darcy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=168469","title":{"rendered":"12 recommended reads for those traveling to Washington, D.C. \u2013 Modern Mrs Darcy"},"content":{"rendered":"


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When I moved to the Washington, D.C. area little more than a year ago, I discovered there were so many good and many not-so-good things about living in the nation\u2019s capital\u2014especially during an election year. I quickly learned how great it is to have a robust and reliable metro system, how few residents are locals so being new in town is nothing unusual, and, most importantly, what times of day to stay off the Beltway.<\/p>\n

I also happily gathered that this is a reading town, with an abundance of independent bookstores, including my own favorite local shop, Old Town Books<\/a><\/strong> in Alexandria. I\u2019m overjoyed to find that authors make their way through town frequently and that I can meet up with bookish friends at frequent Silent Reading parties or for yummy sandwiches with a side of books at Busboys & Poets<\/a><\/strong> in their restaurant-meets-bookshop space.<\/p>\n

But there\u2019s still so much to learn! Where do I turn? To books, of course. In the pages of books, I learned how we got those famous cherry blossoms, which neighborhoods and restaurants mean this or that, and what a lobbyist actually does. I hope to be a rare long-term resident of this capital capitol city, so I\u2019ve got more reading to do. Vote for your favorite D.C. books in the comments!<\/p>\n

Some links (including all Amazon links) are affiliate links. <\/em>More details here<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

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\n\t\"Never\"Never<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tDC meets DA? Yes, please. Many of you might remember I have a thing for DA (Dark Academia<\/a>), so I picked this up for the premise of a clinical study of psychopaths on a college campus. I was DC-lighted (too punny?) to find all the District details sprinkled throughout. The author\u2019s note made clear that Washington D.C. is her \u201ccity of my heart\u201d and the mentions of Old Ebbitt Grill, Logan Circle, U Street, Logan Circle, and I-95 (ugh\u2026 the traffic!) throughout the story made it even clearer. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"Digital\"Digital<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tYes, Dan Brown. Many of his stories take place, or at least start, in the capital. But this one is underrated and too often forgotten in favor of his more popular titles that take place in Washington, The Da Vinci Code<\/em> and The Lost Symbol<\/em>. This spy novel delves into national intelligence and coding. There\u2019s a whole etymological exploration of the word \u201csin-cere\u201d that was just good nerdy fun. The perfect page-turning distraction if you need a break from politics. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"The\"The<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tPower is the currency in this town: name dropping, security clearances, how many degrees of separation you are from the top jobs. There are acronyms galore and polite questions that are really code and it\u2019s all a study in anthropology, especially for someone observing who doesn\u2019t work in politics like me. That\u2019s the situation for Beth in this smart and funny literary fiction. Beth is, like me, both horrified and fascinated by the ambition, competition, and\u2026 the traffic. So much traffic. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"Rachel\"Rachel<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tThis political satire is on my TBR because I hear it’s darkly humorous with a playful cast of charming characters. The premise sounds believable: a staffer gets fired after firing off a critical email of a certain politician. As she\u2019s leaving the building, she\u2019s involved in an accident that leaves her recovering while surrounded by well-meaning parents and roommates. A new job and a new love interest should keep this light, gossipy, and fun. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tMedia is a big part of life in Washington. The press is powerful, so when 20-something Adrienne gets a chance to be on staff at the fictional Capitolist (aka the List), she knows it\u2019s the place to be and jumps at the chance, even though that means leaving her perk-filled job at Town & Country. Working 14-hour days and breaking political scandal stories, all of this humorous contemporary fiction novel was great fun to read and very DC; my favorite part was reading about her forays back to hometown of Middleburg. Middleburg is a small and somewhat sleepy historic town just outside the Beltway, but because of the mix of hunting and horse country vibes with high-tech company proximity, it is very much a part of the power structure of DC. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tVictoria Christopher Murray and Marie Benedict joined us in the Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club<\/a> to talk about another D.C.-adjacent book, The Personal Librarian, so of course I want to read everything they\u2019ve written now. The authors\u2019 partnership produces work rooted in history and friendship. This historical novel is the story of a friendship between First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Civil Rights activist and educator Mary McLeod Bethune. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"Heartburn\"\"Heartburn\"<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tI\u2019m not sure Nora Ephron would be happy to see her novel on a D.C. list since she famously hated it here, but the city figures heavily in the dissolution of her own thinly-veiled fictional marriage to Mark aka Carl Bernstein. Rachel aka Nora has left her beloved NYC for love in DC but despite a glittering group of friends, successful careers, beloved children, their picture-perfect power couple goals come to an end in ways heartbreaking and hilarious. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"The\"The<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tThis work of historical fiction is on my TBR because I\u2019m looking forward to a good story well told by an author who has a reputation for a satisfying ending. Readers follow two Black women living in the 1950s in alternating perspectives; one of the characters in Philadelphia, the other a student at Howard University in D.C. who finds herself working her way up the social ladder with the social elite. I\u2019m also looking forward to finding out what the title could mean! More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"Yellowface\"\"Yellowface\"<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tThis satire has not exactly flown under the radar, but if you\u2019ve read this, you\u2019ll never get that scene on the steps in Georgetown out of your head. I\u2019d never read a story set in the literary world set in DC before and author R.F. Kuang says that\u2019s deliberate: \u201cI\u2019ve never lived in NYC and couldn\u2019t write convincingly about it.\u201d This Potomac-soaked novel makes it clear she\u2019s been a Washington resident as it explores diversity, fictional identities, and social media. What could be more Washingtonian than that? More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"Cherry\"Cherry<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tSome of you might remember how I could not stop talking about my favorite book of last year, The Tree Collectors<\/a><\/em> by Amy Stewart, which led me down a tree rabbit hole to this title. I got to experience my first cherry blossom season here in the capital last spring and it\u2019s such a unifying and formative part of living in this town. For a few dreamy weeks, it\u2019s all anyone can talk about. You can visit vicariously through the pages of photographs, maps, and my favorite Hiroshige prints, no allergy pill required. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"Personal\"Personal<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tIf you\u2019ve seen the excellent political thriller The Post<\/em>, the story of The Washington Post<\/em>\u2019s publication of the classified Pentagon Papers, you might have wanted to learn more about the powerhouse woman behind Meryl Streep\u2019s character. I immediately dashed out and bought this memoir. This would be an excellent nonfiction counterpoint to Heartburn<\/em>, since Graham presided over the Washington Post as it broke the famous Watergate scandal, which made Carl Bernstein famous. (It\u2019s a small, big town.) More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\"The\"The<\/a>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\tThis is the psychological litfic novel I rarely recommend even though I took it down in practically one unputdownable gulp. Here\u2019s why: this book is salacious and shocking. There\u2019s a rough and ugly core papered over with public gentility. The Cave Dwellers follows the lives of privileged teens and their families as they socialize, power-grab, and deal with the aftermath of a murder in their midst. It grapples with hard topics like class and is positively filled with unlikeable characters, which is kind of like this city sometimes. Have I talked you out of it? Don\u2019t let me. For all that, I haven\u2019t been able to stop thinking about it since I read it years ago. Even so, mind your (many) triggers. It\u2019s not going to be for every reader. More info \u2192<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Do you have any favorite books set in D.C.? Please share in the comments.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

P.S. 23 recommended reads for those traveling to Chicago<\/a>, 12 recommended reads for those traveling to Maine (or who want to)<\/a>, and more literary tourism<\/a>.<\/p>\n

About the author<\/h2>\n
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Ginger Horton<\/strong>\u00a0is our Book Club Community Manager here at MMD. Her go-to genres are literary fiction and classics. You can find Ginger on Instagram posting as herself\u00a0@gthorton<\/a>\u00a0or in the MMD Book Club account @MMDBookClub<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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