My enormously grateful thanks to Amanda at Moonflower for sending me a copy of The Hiding Season by Ava Glass in return for an honest review. It is my pleasure to share my review today.
You’ll find my review of Ava’s The Traitor here and of The Trap here.
Published by Penguin on 13th August 2026, The Hiding Season is available for purchase through the publisher links here.
The Hiding Season
Maya Landry is in desperate need of a fresh start.
Alone and heartbroken, she finds work as a caretaker at an exclusive ski resort for the elite in the mountains of Montana. Quiet and empty in the summer months, it’s the perfect escape.
All Maya wants is to be alone. But she’s not alone on the mountain. Someone else is there. A killer with his next victim in his sights.
After Maya finds a body, she must run for her life. One man tells her that he can save her. But can she trust him? Is he everything he claims to be?
Only one thing is certain: the killer will stop at nothing. And Maya is the only witness to their crime . . .
My Review of The Hiding Season
Maya has a new job.
Having so enjoyed the other books by Ava Glass that I’ve read I had very high expectations of The Hiding Season. Not only did The Hiding Season meet those expectations, it exceeded every one. I thought it was an absolute belter of a read.
The plot is breath-taking. It zips along so that the reader is transfixed, unable to set the book aside for fear of missing the action. It’s exciting, menacing and twisty, making for a real thriller of a read. The insight into organised crime is completely unnerving and so authentic that, even now I’ve finished reading The Hiding Season, I find myself thinking about Maya and what is happening to her. Equally impressive is the sense of place. Descriptions truly place the reader alongside Maya.
Maya is a brilliant character. Shaped by the events that happen to her and her relationships with her family, she blends a need for affection and a desire to belong with steely determination and strength, making her authentic and likeable. It’s impossible to read The Hiding Season without backing Maya wholeheartedly. I loved the dynamics between her and Riley.
Riley is also a magnificent creation. I found the underlying sexual tension between him and Maya completely believable. Riley is resourceful and enigmatic – a perfect blend for an FBI agent. Ava Glass constructs the relationship between Maya and Riley totally convincingly so that the reader is absorbed in and utterly invested in what happens to them.
Alongside the blistering pace, the mesmerising events and the convincing characters are fabulous themes. The Hiding Season is not just a physical location, but is personality and institution too. I won’t say more for fear of spoiling the read. Trust, identity, true friendship, and what constitutes home and belonging all underpin the action too so that when events force Maya into certain decisions and actions, not only is it exciting, but it is also heart-breaking.
I thought The Hiding Season was fabulous. It meets in spades all those cliched terms we apply to fiction – fast-paced, unputdownable, a page turner – and illustrates just what a superb thriller should be. It’s fantastic and I couldn’t recommend it more heartily.
About Ava Glass
Dubbed ‘The new queen of spy fiction’ by the Guardian newspaper, and ‘the real thing’ by the Washington Post, A.C. ‘Ava’ Glass is the CWA Dagger-shortlisted author of Alias Emma (The Chase), The Traitor and The Trap. The Traitor was a 2023 Richard and Judy Bookclub pick. Alias Emma was a Barnes and Noble book of the month. A former crime reporter and communications consultant, for five years Ava worked closely with spies. Her time in that world fascinated her, and the people she met back then inspire every book she writes.
For further information, visit Ava’s website, find her on Facebook, or follow her on Bluesky and Instagram.
