If you are a pop culture freak like me, your feed must be flooding with fan edits and clips of Prime Video’s new German series Maxton Hall. This show has become the internet’s new obsession, grabbing all the attention from viewers across the world. There’s no denying that everyone loves a good romance story, and Maxton Hall’s enemies-to-lovers trope adds more spice to it. From BookTok girlies to Stan Twitter, everyone is having a field day analysing every scene from the show while waiting for the new season.
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If you aren’t familiar, Maxton Hall’s story is based on a German book titled Save Me, written by Mona Kasten. Maxton Hall’s plot revolves around Ruby Bell, who wants nothing to do with money, power, beauty, or luxury, but her world takes a turn when she meets the king of the high school and millionaire heir James Beaufort, who thinks money can buy anything. As the story unfolds, they find an undeniable attraction between them which becomes hard to resist.
Maxton Hall has a good dose of slow burn and angst in the show, which we can also find in some of the popular books. And till the time you are waiting for the second season, scroll down to read books with a familiar vibe as Maxton Hall.
1. Fool Me Twice by Nona Uppal
Set in New Delhi, Fool Me Twice is an unconventional story that will stump readers expecting a good, old romance trope. We meet and fall in love with a young couple planning their futures together when life rudely hijacks the steering wheel. Exploring the ways a twenty-year-old navigates grief and life after a loss that shatters most fifty-year-olds, Fool Me Twice looks at the complexity of falling in love ‘again’ at an age where most are falling for the first time, and what it feels like to move on from mourning one great love to make room for another.
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2. Frappes for Three by Vidhya Sathyamoorthy
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Maya Joseph is a Penang girl who dreams of becoming a writer despite her father’s objections. Chong Mei Li is a stylish fashionista who wants to make her mark in the fashion world, although her parents want her to preserve their legacy by taking over the family business in Sabah. Rohan Das, born and raised in Delhi, needs to work hard and secure a good job to support his middle-class family.
As the firstborn son, there’s a lot of pressure on him to excel and little room for him to explore his own interests. As luck would have it, their paths cross at Maestro University, and this unlikely trio soon becomes good friends. This book is a story of love, loss and self-discovery reminds us that university life, often bittersweet, carves us into the people we are today. And many of the lessons we gain are learned outside the classroom with our dearest friends.
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3. The Hating Game by Sally Thorne
Lucy Hutton and Joshua Templeman hate each other. Not dislike. Not begrudgingly tolerate. Hate. And they have no problem displaying their feelings through a series of ritualistic passive aggressive maneuvers as they sit across from each other, executive assistants to co-CEOs of a publishing company. Lucy can’t understand Joshua’s joyless, uptight, meticulous approach to his job. Joshua is clearly baffled by Lucy’s overly bright clothes, quirkiness, and Pollyanna attitude.
Now up for the same promotion, their battle of wills has come to a head and Lucy refuses to back down when their latest game could cost her her dream job…But the tension between Lucy and Joshua has also reached its boiling point, and Lucy is discovering that maybe she doesn’t hate Joshua. And maybe, he doesn’t hate her either. Or maybe this is just another game.
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4. The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas
Catalina Martín desperately needs a date to her sister’s wedding. Especially since her little white lie about her American boyfriend has spiralled out of control. Now everyone she knows—including her ex and his fiancée—will be there and eager to meet him. She only has four weeks to find someone willing to cross the Atlantic and aid in her deception. New York to Spain is no short flight and her raucous family won’t be easy to fool.
Enter Aaron Blackford—her tall, handsome, condescending colleague—who surprisingly offers to step in. She’d rather refuse; never has there been a more aggravating, blood-boiling, and insufferable man. But Catalina is desperate, and as the wedding draws nearer, Aaron looks like her best option. And she begins to realise he might not be as terrible in the real world as he is at the office.
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5. The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren
Olive is always unlucky: in her career, in love, in…well, everything. Her identical twin sister Ami, on the other hand, is probably the luckiest person in the world. Her meet-cute with her fiancé is something out of a romantic comedy (gag) and she’s managed to finance her entire wedding by winning a series of Internet contests (double gag). Worst of all, she’s forcing Olive to spend the day with her sworn enemy, Ethan, who just happens to be the best man.
Olive braces herself to get through 24 hours of wedding hell before she can return to her comfortable, unlucky life. But when the entire wedding party gets food poisoning from eating bad shellfish, the only people who aren’t affected are Olive and Ethan. And now there’s an all-expenses-paid honeymoon in Hawaii up for grabs. Putting their mutual hatred aside for the sake of a free vacation, Olive and Ethan head for paradise, determined to avoid each other at all costs.
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6. Beach Read by Emily Henry
Augustus Everett is an acclaimed author of literary fiction. January Andrews writes bestselling romance. When she pens a happily ever after, he kills off his entire cast. They’re polar opposites just the Maxton Hall couple. In fact, the only thing they have in common is that for the next three months, they’re living in neighboring beach houses, broke, and bogged down with writer’s block.
Until, one hazy evening, one thing leads to another and they strike a deal designed to force them out of their creative ruts: Augustus will spend the summer writing something happy, and January will pen the next Great American Novel. She’ll take him on field trips worthy of any rom-com montage, and he’ll take her to interview surviving members of a backwoods death cult (obviously). Everyone will finish a book and no-one will fall in love. Really.
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7. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
A tour de force of wit and sparkling dialogue, Pride and Prejudice shows how the headstrong Elizabeth Bennet and the aristocratic Mr Darcy must have their pride humbled and their prejudices dissolved before they can acknowledge their love for each other. Jane Austen’s best-loved novel is an unforgettable story about the inaccuracy of first impressions, the power of reason, and above all the strange dynamics of human relationships and emotions.
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