10 Of The Best Books Like The White Lotus

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“Oh, it’s a good feeling when you realise that someone has money. ‘Cause then you don’t have to worry about them wanting yours.”

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Looking for that delicious blend of claustrophobic luxury, unhinged wealthy behaviour, and simmering dark satire? If The White Lotus left a void that scrolling through social media just can’t fill, you’re not alone. HBO’s smash hit mastered the art of trapping overly privileged people in paradise and letting their darkest secrets unravel. But the TV show didn’t invent the trope – literature has been refining the “disastrous high-society retreat” for decades. Whether you’re craving a sun-soaked coastal noir, sharp social commentary, or a thrilling murder mystery set in an exclusive five-star resort, these books all capture that exact blend of opulence, tension, and elite drama. Grab your favourite cocktail and leave your morals at the check-in desk – here are the ultimate books like The White Lotus to add to your TBR pile. 

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The Guest List – Lucy Foley

Kicking off our list of books like The White Lotus is Lucy Foley’s global bestseller, The Guest List. On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favours, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be patchy and the waves rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed. 

But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast. And then someone turns up dead. 

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Check Out Our The Guest List Book Review

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Bad Summer People – Emma Rosenblum

Jen Weinstein and Lauren Parker rule the town of Salcombe, Fire Island every summer. They hold sway on the beach and the tennis court, and are adept at manipulating people to get what they want. Their husbands, Sam and Jason, have summered together on the island since childhood, despite lifelong grudges and numerous secrets. Their one single friend, Rachel Woolf, is looking to meet her match, whether he’s a tennis pro or someone else’s husband. 

But even with plenty to gossip about, this season starts out as quietly as any other. Until a body is discovered, face down on the side of the boardwalk. Stylish, subversive and darkly comedic like The White Lotus, this is a story about what’s lurking under the surface of picture-perfect lives in a place where everyone has something to hide. 

Cover Story – Susan Rigetti

After a rough year at NYU, aspiring writer Lora Ricci is thrilled to land a summer internship at ELLE Magazine, where she meets Cat Wolff. Cat takes Lora under her wing, soliciting her help with side projects and encouraging her writing. As a friendship emerges between the two of them, Cat proposes that Lora drop out of NYU and become her ghostwriter. Writing during the day and accompanying Cat to extravagant parties at night, Lora’s life shifts from nightmare to dream-come-true. Yet, as Lora is drawn further into  Cat’s glamorous lifestyle, Cat’s perfect exterior cracks, exposing an illicit, shady world. 

Susan Rigetti pieces together a perceptive, humorous caper full of sharp observations about scam culture. Cover Story is a fresh, fun, and wholly original novel similar to The White Lotus that takes readers deep into the codependency and deceit found in a relationship built on power imbalances and lies. 

The Resort – Sara Ochs

When Cass sets foot on the coast of Thailand’s world-famous party island, she’s searching for an escape. With dark secrets following her every move, Koh Sang becomes the perfect spot to hide. Now, years later, Cass is a local dive instructor alongside the Permenants, a group of expats who have claimed the island as their own. 

The Permenants don’t linger on who they were before the island. Simply because, like Cass, they all have something to outrun. But suddenly, a dive student is found dead, and paradise comes crashing down. Because this isn’t the first mysterious death on the island, and it won’t be the last. Someone knows who Cass is, and they’re ready to make sure justice is finally served. 

Pineapple Street – Jenny Jackson

Darley, the eldest daughter in the well-connected old money Stockton family, followed her heart, trading her job and her inheritance for motherhood, but giving up far too much in the process; Sasha, a middle-class New England girl, has married into the Brooklyn Heights family, and finds herself cast as the arriviste outsider; and Georgina, the baby of the family, has fallen in love with someone she can’t have and must choose what sort of person she wants to be.

Shot through with the indulgent pleasures of life among New York’s one-percenters, Pineapple Street is an addictive, escapist novel that sparkles with wit. Full of recognisable, lovable characters, it’s about the peculiar unknowability of someone else’s family, the miles between the haves and have-nots, and the insanity of first love – all wrapped in a deliciously funny, sharply observed debut of family, love, and class. 

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Check Out The Best Books About Rich, Awful People

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Nine Perfect Strangers – Liane Moriarty

Nine people gather at a remote health resort. Amidst all of the luxury and pampering, the mindfulness and meditation, they know that the next ten days may involve some real work. But none of them is prepared for just how challenging things are about to get. Frances Welty, bestselling romance novelist, arrives at Tranquillum House nursing a bad back, a broken heart, and an exquisitely painful paper cut. She’s immediately intrigued by her fellow guests, and the strange and charismatic owner/director of this wellness resort. 

But it’s not long before every guest at Tranquillum House is asking the exact same question: Should they put aside their doubts and fully immerse in everything it has to offer – or run while they still can? 

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Check Out The Best Books Like Nine Perfect Strangers

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The Unwedding – Ally Condie

Ellery Wainwright is alone at the edge of the world. She and her husband, Luke, were supposed to spend their twentieth wedding anniversary together at the luxurious Resort at Broken Point in Big Sur, California. Where better to celebrate a marriage, a family, and a life together than at one of the most stunning places on Earth? But now she’s travelling solo. 

To add insult to injury, there’s a wedding at Broken Point scheduled during her stay. Ellery remembers how it felt to be on the cusp of everything new and wonderful, with a loved and certain future glimmering just ahead. Now she isn’t certain of anything except her love for her kids and a growing realisation that this place, although beautiful, is unsettling. 

The Guest – Emma Cline

Summer is coming to an end on the East End of Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome. A misstep at a dinner party, and the older man she’s been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city. 

With few resources and a waterlogged phone, but blessed with the ability to navigate the desires of others, Alex stays on Long Island and drifts like a ghost through the hedged lanes, gated driveways, and sun-blasted dunes of a rarefied world that is, at first, sealed off from her. Propelled by desperation and a mutable sense of morality, she spends the week leading up to Labour Day moving from one place to the next, a cypher leaving destruction in her wake. 

The Club – Ellery Lloyd

The Home Group is a glamorous collection of celebrity members’ clubs dotted across the globe, where the rich and famous can party hard and then crash out in its five-star suites, far from the prying eyes of fans and the media. The most spectacular of all is Island Home – a closely guarded, ultra-luxurious resort just off the English coast – and its three-day launch party is easily the most coveted A-list invite of the decade. 

But, behind the scenes, tensions are at breaking point. Everyone has something to hide – and that’s before the beautiful people with their own ugly secrets even set foot on the island. As tempers fray and behaviours worsen, as things get more sinister by the hour and the body count starts piling up, some of Island Home’s members will begin to wish they’d never made the guest list. 

Malibu Rising – Taylor Jenkins Reid

It’s the day of Nina Riva’s annual end-of-summer party. Everyone wants to be around the famous Riva siblings. Together, they are a source of fascination in Malibu and the world over – especially as the offspring of the legendary singer, Mick Riva. The only person not looking forward to the party this year is Nina herself. 

By midnight, the party will be completely out of control. By morning, the Riva mansion will have gone up in flames. But before that first spark in the early hours before dawn, the alcohol will flow, the music will play, and the loves and secrets that have shaped this family’s generations will all come bubbling to the surface. Similar to The White Lotus, Malibu Rising is a story about one unforgettable night in the life of a family: the night they all have to choose what they will keep from the people who made them… and what they will leave behind. 

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Check Out The Best Books Like Malibu Rising

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