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- Millennials and Gen Z are swapping wild party weekends for quiet reading retreats.
- Mackenzie Newcomb, founder of Bad Bitch Book Club, says people seek community at these popular getaways.
- Prominent literary figure Zibby Owens also hosts sold-out retreats, often with authors discussing books.
Travel is booked.
In the latest sign that younger generations are opting for far quieter, more wholesome lives than their forebears, millennials and Gen Zs are eschewing raucous weekend getaways involving nightclubs and gambling for dedicated reading retreats. They’re paying upwards of $1,000 to hit the books with strangers for a weekend.
According to Google, “reading weekend” is a top trend of 2026, and on Pinterest, searches for book club retreat ideas are up 265%.
“People are looking for community,” said Mackenzie Newcomb, the 33-year-old founder of the Bad Bitch Book Club. “They want to go somewhere with people who like to do the same things, and with us everyone likes to read. If you want to skip a boat cruise on the river and read all day, that is OK. No one will judge you.”
Newcomb considers herself one of the originators of the trend. She founded BBC at the height of the pandemic in early 2021 as an online community. As the world opened up, the group’s 6,000 members were eager to meet in person.
In August 2021, they held their first retreat, at an adventure camp in Maine. The group has since hosted some 300 weekends in locations from Nashville to Santa Barbara. Prices typically starts at $900, including meals and activities such as yoga and white water rafting. Attendees read books of their choosing, though a publisher-sponsored “book bar” also offers several titles for free. The getaways regularly sell out.
Zibby Owens, a prominent figure in the literary world who has her own publishing house and a bookstore in Santa Monica, Calif., also regularly hosts reading retreats. She says they’ve all sold out.
Her first one, held in March 2023 in Hamptons Bay, attracted around 40 people for the whole weekend, plus another 100 day-pass guests. She’s since held events from Charleston to Chicago and Palm Springs to Scottsdale.
Each getaway focuses on four to six books, with authors attending to discuss their work. Some books — like Andrea Dunlop’s “Women are the Fiercest Creatures — are indie offerings from her own company, while others — such as Kristin Hannah’s “The Women” — are major blockbusters.
While reading is typically thought of as a solitary activity, Owens said the events lend it a social element that many are craving.
“Some book lovers are introverted, but not all,” the 49-year-old noted. “There is a misconception that to love a book you have to be a homebody. Book lovers love to connect, and part of it is the innate curiosity about other people.”
Page Break, a reading retreat series that started in 2024, takes an especially focused approached. Each event zones in on a single book that guests read aloud together throughout the weekend. The getaways have been so popular that organizer Mikey Friedman now books the retreats, which typically have space for 15, on a lottery system. Themed food and drink and boutique lodging — past locations have included Scribner’s Catskill Lodge in upstate New York and AutoCamp in Joshua Tree, Calif. — are part of the fun.
The next event, set for Mother’s Day weekend, will focus on Bryan Washington’s “Palaver,” a novel about a gay man estranged from his mother that was a finalist for the National Book Award.
For $1,300, guest will get two nights at the The Heartwood hotel in Poughkeepsie, all meals for the weekend — including a five-course dinner and brunch feast — unlimited wine, snacks, yoga and a Page Break hoodie.
Nic Marna traveled from London to upstate New York to attend a Page Break event in 2024 and said the weekend reading “In Tongues” by Thomas Grattan — who stopped by for a Q and A — was worth the long trip.
“Discussing the book in chunks with other people at the retreat made it really fun,” he said.
Nnenna Odeluga, 36, recently attended a Page Break focused on “The Children” by Melissa Albert, and loved the poached pear dessert that referenced the book and the fact that they got to read it early — the fantasy novel isn’t out until June.
“We were the first readers,” enthused the Brooklynite, who works in advertising. “How cool is that?”
For Odeluga, who has also attended BBC getaways, another part of the appeal is that these trips are typically all-inclusive, with all meals and activities planned out.
“It’s all wrapped up in the package,” she enthused.
But, as Artavia Jarvis, a 36-year-old nanny who lives in Manhattan and has attended three retreats, notes, it’s perfectly OK to skip scheduled activities — like book bedazzling, journaling and book swaps — to read.
“There is an itinerary for the weekend, but you are not bound to it,” she said.
While the retreats attract plenty of Gothamites, Owens said she gets people from all over, from locations that might not be on every author’s promotional tour.
“In New York, we have book events at our fingertips, and access to authors is not rare,” said Owens, who divides her time between Manhattan and Santa Monica. “But for the two girls who come to every retreat from Minneapolis, this is so special for them.”
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