The last few weeks of the year are marked by movement. Some people might return to their hometown to spend the holidays with their family and friends, while others may use the lull to take a much-needed vacation. Travelers flock to airports and train stations, anxious to reach their final destination. Tempers may flare as the stress of the season reaches a fever pitch. But it helps us all get where we’re going if we remember that, for the most part, everyone—even the weary parent trying to manage their child on a plane—is trying their best.

The opportunity that transit provides for reflection, escape, and connection is a deep well of inspiration for authors of both nonfiction and fiction. A trip to the Dominican Republic inspired Richard Ratay to examine the conditions that created the “peak family road trip” in the ’60s and ’70s, and how seeing the world from a car can expose us to different ways of life. After all, a wandering mind can accomplish something powerful while staring out of a vehicle’s window: Cora, the protagonist of Carol Bensimon’s We All Loved Cowboys, uses the sights on a car odyssey home to distract herself from what the end of the trip might mean for her relationship with her ex-girlfriend.

Journeys, ultimately, must end. People must come to terms with where they’ve ended up or consider what they left behind. Going home can feel particularly daunting; one may return to a place they don’t recognize, or find that they themselves have changed in ways that mean it will never be the same. In 2016, Ta-Nehisi Coates reflected on trying to return to his old neighborhood after the success of Between the World and Me, and finding the move not as simple as he thought. And in May, the author Maxim Osipov chronicled his experience as one of many Russians fleeing the country after its invasion of Ukraine. To escape, the travelers had to claim they were leaving temporarily, for a vacation—in truth, they were taking the first step on a voyage with no end in sight and no clear path home.

What We’re Reading

The Atlantic

The dilemma of babies on airplanes

“The tension between the needs of children and the comfort, order, and efficiency of adult life play out everywhere: restaurants, doctor’s offices, grocery stores, malls, workplaces, you name it. Children just don’t fit neatly into the adult world.”

Steven Gottlieb / Getty

The rise and fall of the family-vacation road trip

“It sure felt back then a lot more like when you went on a family vacation, you were setting off into the wild frontier on a great adventure together. You as a family were going to have to overcome these challenges and find ways to deal with them. I don’t think it feels that way anymore.”

Viktoriia1208 / Shutterstock / Arsh Raziuddin / The Atlantic

A road-trip novel that punctures political myopia

“Even a reader vehemently opposed to industrialized agriculture could laugh at the line No one with a free spirit would believe in Monsanto. Still, it’s easy to empathize with the aggravating Cora. She’s in a torturous position: in love with a woman who’s glad to have sex with her but dodging the possibility of more.”

Jack Boucher / Library of Congress

On homecomings

“We didn’t expect to live anonymously. We thought there might be some interest and we took some steps to dissuade that interest. Those steps failed.”

Gueorgui Pinkhassov / Magnum

Cold, ashamed, relieved: on leaving Russia

“Saying goodbye to your home and possessions was easy: Is it appropriate to grow sentimental when Russian bombs are falling on Kharkiv and Kyiv, Mariupol and Lviv? On the way to the airport, you drove through Moscow. Although this is where you were born, where you studied and lived, it has long been enemy territory. Parting with people is hard, nearly impossible; parting with Moscow is easy.”