Hi there darlings! Let’s talk about your next holiday read. Because every so often a book lands on your TBR that is exactly what summer ordered: turquoise water, over-water villas, two gorgeously bruised hearts, and a fling that absolutely refuses to stay casual. A Moment in The Maldives by Susannah Hockham is that book.
This is a spicy, grumpy x sunshine, second chance energy, and rom com warmth all wrapped up in paradise. Consider this your permission slip to pack it for your next holiday.
A Moment in The Maldives by Susannah Hockham: Synopsis
At your lowest ebb, you can either sink or swim.
Meet Cassie. Marketing exec, and having a truly terrible summer. She has just been jilted by her “loving” fiancé in front of her family and friends, and to add insult to heartbreak, she can’t get a refund on their gloriously expensive honeymoon to the Maldives. So she does the only sensible thing a woman can do in that situation. She goes anyway. Solo.
Because if the villa is booked and paid for, someone may as well be drinking cocktails in it.
Then there’s Tom. Investment broker, and having an equally dire year. His perfect life imploded the day he walked in on his girlfriend and his best mate having a very unwelcome sleepover. In his bed.
Needing to disappear from the wreckage, he holes up in the Maldives to bury himself in work and pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist. And then, of course, fate does what fate does. Cassie and Tom turn out to be island neighbours.
Both of them are emotionally raw. Both of them have romance somewhere at the very bottom of their to-do list, filed under “absolutely not.” But after a suitably awkward first meeting, those first ripples of attraction start to build. And they keep building. Slowly, then all at once, into a full passionate tidal wave neither of them planned for.
Because this is just a holiday fling, right? No strings. No expectations. No problem when it’s time to fly home. But a week is a very long time in the Maldives…
The Tropes Are Everything a Summer Read Should Be
Let’s go through them:
- Grumpy x Sunshine: a grumpy guy x sunshine woman dynamic every day of the week.
- Second Chance: two people at rock bottom, both certain they’re done with love, both very wrong about that.
- Rom Com: a funny, warm, beach read full of banter.
- Maldives Setting: over-water villas, endless blue, and a countdown clock ticking against them.
- 30+ FMC/40+ MMC: Cassie is a 37 year old woman with a career and a spectacularly messy year behind her. Tom is a 42 year old investment broker who thought he had his life figured out… It’s extremely refreshing to read about a couple older than the usual 20-somethings you find in most romance books nowadays!
Spice Level: 4/5 Spicy 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️
About Susannah Hockham
Susannah Hockham is a self-confessed romantic and lifelong book lover, which, honestly, is exactly the energy you want from someone writing a sun-soaked holiday romance. A mum of two, she works in magazine publishing by day, and alongside her novels she also writes short stories for women’s magazines. A Moment in The Maldives is her debut novel!
Content Warnings
A Moment in The Maldives is a fairly gentle read on the content front, with no overt triggers. It does touch on pregnancy deception.
Who Is This Book For?
This one’s for the readers who love a spicy contemporary romance that leans into rom com, second chance, and grumpy x sunshine all at once. If you don’t mind some heat on the page, you want chemistry that builds from awkward to undeniable, and you’re craving a book that reads like a holiday even when you’re stuck on your sofa, then A Moment in The Maldives by Susannah Hockham belongs in your beach bag.
It’s the perfect pick if you loved Every Summer After, It Happened One Summer, or Problematic Summer Romance and you’re chasing that same sun-drenched, second-chance feeling.
Want the full details, tropes, and spice breakdown? Explore the dedicated book page, or grab your copy now on Amazon, Bookshop.org, or Books2Read!
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