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Moonlight Express

Around the World By Night Train

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Moonlight Express

By: Monisha Rajesh
Narrated by: Monisha Rajesh
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SHORTLISTED FOR TRAVEL BOOK OF THE YEAR AT THE 2026 EDWARD STANFORD TRAVEL WRITING AWARDS
SHORTLISTED FOR TRAVEL BOOK OF THE YEAR AT THE 2026 INSPIRE GLOBAL MEDIA AWARDS
A FINANCIAL TIMES READERS BOOK OF THE YEAR

From the author of the smash-hit Around the World in 80 Trains comes a new globetrotting journey - this time celebrating the peculiar magic and mayhem of the night train.

'Nobody writes trains like Monisha Rajesh' Irvine Welsh
'Hugely entertaining' The Times
'A moonlit express train to travel writing heaven. This is Monisha Rajesh's wittiest and most irresistible adventure yet' William Dalrymple

The wonder of the night train: headlamps ablaze, passengers boarding after sunset and leaving before sunrise, slipping in and out of compartments unseen. For Monisha Rajesh, the singular thrill of sleeper trains inspired a new journey around the world – one filled with moonlit landscapes, cosy compartments and quirky companions.

From Austria’s Nightjet to the Caledonian Sleeper and the Santa Claus Express, Rajesh invites us on an adventure aboard the world’s most wondrous night trains. Along the way, she samples reindeer stew in Scandinavia, retraces the original route of the Orient Express, sips on pisco sours aboard the Andean Explorer, and watches the sun rise over the Potomac River on the Silver Meteor to New York.

A decade ago night trains were giving way to budget airlines and high-speed rail. But as people search for slower and more environmentally friendly ways to travel, night trains are in the midst of a renaissance. By turns romantic and hilarious, Moonlight Express brings us along for the ride – and drops us back at the platform before sunrise.©2025 Monisha Rajesh (P)2025 Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Europe Travel Writing & Commentary Funny Witty
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Critic reviews

Eloquently and amusingly combines the fact and fiction, the cocktail hours and backed-up loos, the charming ticket inspectors and deranged fellow travellers, as she enjoys – and endures – 18 journeys spanning four continents . . . Hugely entertaining (Christian House)
Full of the stuff of life . . . Rajesh is excellent at drawing out the reasons why people are travelling by train and most have a story to tell (Christian Wolmar)
With wit and flair, Monisha Rajesh takes readers aboard night trains across Europe, India, South Africa, the USA, Canada and Peru . . . Rajesh is a sharp and perceptive writer with a keen eye for detail and context . . . Packed with evocative details and rich reflections (Shafik Meghji)
Monisha Rajesh is no stranger to the railway’s magic, having written about her journeys around India and circumnavigating the globe by train. Here, she takes night trains in Finland, Scotland, Austria, Turkey and Bulgaria, Peru and the US . . . She can write beautifully, describing a view or recalling a conversation (Jason Goodwin)
Rajesh’s adventures – involving multiple sleeper trains – are filled with literary wonderment, plot twists and unsavoury revelations . . . Rajesh is never didactic, weaving these revelations into her human encounters . . . Mesmerising prose tantalises readers to not only read one but also experience for themselves the routes that Rajesh has embarked on . . . Written beautifully as a travel journalist’s love letter to trains, her book is also an implicit argument for the kinds of social bonds that are maintained with “less efficient” means of transport. It is a book to savour (Shawn Hoo)
I love trains, and nobody writes trains like Monisha Rajesh. Most of all, I’m nuts about night trains. You can’t beat shuffling into a dead, post-apocalyptic station, slipping or battling into sleep, and waking up, emerging into another city that is just coming alive (IRVINE WELSH, author of Trainspotting)
Rajesh represents a new generation of traveller. Funny, perceptive and lyrical (Arifa Akbar)
Recently night trains have made a comeback . . . This revival is at the heart of Monisha Rajesh’s entertaining travelogue in which she describes eighteen journeys made by night train across four continents
All stars
Most relevant
This is the 2nd audio book I’ve listened too from the author and it was going well, until …

the the author in chapter 11 about 39min in says , and I quote ….

“I wish white parents would explain racism to there kids”

“… as racism doesn’t actually affect them ( white people) or their kids…”

So the kiddies dance school in Warrington , or the pop concert in Manchester didn’t affect white children ?

What a spectacularly stupid thing to say in a book about train travel. I’m absolutely flabbergasted.

Dumbfounded .

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So many observations on humanity and the interaction with the world around us. Beautifully read by the author as if she were chatting over a coffee.

Mesmerising travel memoir

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Loved the whole book. Liked that her funny friends joined her again for bits of the journey too!

I was so excited for Monisha’s next book and she didn’t disappoint!

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Some wonderful stories of the delights of train travel. Sparks some happy memories of my trips

Amazing stories

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As a family that have used sleeper trains through Europe on a regular basis, I love the passion Monisha has for the sleeper services and the book certainly whetted my appetite for further travel, but, as someone from an extremely poor family whose grandmother never received an education as she was forced into 'service' (slavery) at the age of 12 and a grandfather who was sent down the pits at the age of 13, it was galling to read so many references to the big bad white man causing all the world's problems The overwhelming majority of white people did not benefit from slavery or colonisation, a very wealthy few did and I despise them every bit as much as Monisha does. I don't believe for one minute that Monisha is anti white people (she obviously made friends with lots of white people on her journeys), but the frequent digs at white men did grate. A shame as those references aside, I absolutely loved the book.

Struck a chord, but....

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