Ok, here’s what scandalous book the Palm Royale series is based on

If The White Lotus has left a gaping hole in your life while we patiently wait for season three to appear, there’s a high chance you’re plunged into AppleTV+’s Palm Royale series while you wait. Hot weather, heinous behaviour and a high end country club are the ingredients which have us all wishing we were part of Florida’s most elite social circle— ’60s kaftans and wide-brimmed hats included.

And it turns out, the social scrambling of debutant Maxine Simmons/Delacourt is actually based on the plot of a book. So, in case you’re curious about which novel the series stemmed from and what the key differences are between the two plots, here’s everything you need to know:

Okay so, which book is the Palm Royale series actually based on?

Credit: AppleTV+

Palm Royale took its inspiration from the 2018 novel Mr and Mrs American Pie by Juliet McDaniel. But it appears the book follows a pretty wildly different plot to the TV show. The blurb reads: “The year is 1969. Dick Nixon was just sworn in as the thirty-seventh President of the United States. Neil Armstrong just took one small step for man and one giant leap for mankind. And notable Palm Springs socialite Maxine Simmons just found out that her husband is leaving her for his twenty-two-year-old secretary.” What?!

It continues: “After a public meltdown at Thanksgiving, Maxine finds herself not only divorced but exiled to Scottsdale, Arizona. However, these desert boondocks will not be her end—only her Elba. The former beauty queen sets her eyes on a new crown: that of the Mrs. American Pie pageant, awarded to the nation’s best wife and mother. Maxine only has one problem: to win the crown she’ll need to find—or build—a family of her own.”

So, in contrast to the AppleTV+ series where Maxine tries to scrape her way into Palm Beach society by manipulating her way into the Palm Royale country club and bankrupting herself to keep up appearances, the book shows her try to win the Mrs. American Pie pageant with a fake family. Wild. Looks like we’ve all got some reading to do.

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Featured image credit via Apple TV+