Travel
The Rough Guide to Romania by Tim Burford remains the most thorough English-language travel guide, updated periodically and particularly good on hiking and rural Romania.
Romania: A Cultural History by Nicholas Catanoy provides deeper context for travellers who want to understand what they're seeing.
History and Politics
Red Horizons by Ion Mihai Pacepa — a defector's account of life inside Ceaușescu's intelligence apparatus. Sensationalist in places, but a vivid portrait of how the regime operated.
The Balkans: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers, 1804–2011 by Misha Glenny places Romania in its regional context across two centuries of upheaval.
Kiss the Hand You Cannot Bite by Edward Behr covers the rise and fall of Ceaușescu. Well-researched and readable.
Literature
The Land of Green Plums by Herta Müller — a Nobel Prize-winning novel set in Ceaușescu's Romania, written by a member of the Banat German minority. Haunting and essential.
Youth Without Youth by Mircea Eliade — Romania's most internationally known writer explores myth and time. More accessible than his academic work on the history of religions.
Nostalgia by Mircea Cărtărescu — five interconnected novellas from Romania's most celebrated contemporary writer. Strange, literary, and deeply rooted in Bucharest.
Dracula
Dracula by Bram Stoker (1897) — the original novel drew loosely on Transylvanian setting and the historical figure of Vlad Țepeș. The Transylvania of the novel bears little resemblance to the actual place, but it created an enduring mythology that continues to drive tourism.
In Search of Dracula by Radu Florescu and Raymond T. McNally — the scholarly investigation of the connection between Stoker's fiction and the real Vlad III. Useful background before visiting Sighișoara or Bran Castle.