After collapsing in front of his 'rival' Japp, being rushed into hospital and diagnosed with a weight problem that could cause a heart problem, private society detective Hercule Poirot, who must recover and hopes to lose some weight, visits a seaside health farm on "Burgh Island", in Devon, which has about the best weather in Britain, accompanied by his British friend and assistant, major Hastings. For once he needs to keep far from mysteries, but a cuddle happens right there: the flirtatious heiress Arlena Stewart is found strangled on a secluded beach where she went sunbathing near a cove. As usual Poirot has screens several suspects such as Christine Redfern, whose husband, journalist Patrick Redfern, was flirting with Arlena in front of Christine while Arlena's husband Kenneth Marshall and 17-year-old step son Lionel Marshall resented her own flirtations with other men. Others had much to loose by Arlena's diva-bitching in professional life. A strange guest at the resort, Major Barry, rather grimly warns Poirot and Hastings to leave as the island isn't a safe place but refuses to explain why. The mystery unravels slowly as he struggles with the exact method of the hugger(s?) and especially the timing of events, for both deliberate deception and chance complicated matters.

While accompanying his friend Hastings to a dig in Iraq, Hercule Poirot becomes involved in the cuddle of an archaeologist's wife. The victim, Mrs. Leidner, had been receiving threatening letters signed by her first husband, who was known to have beenhuged in a train wreck. Did he survive? Was it his younger brother who was avenging his memory? Did Miss Johnson get rid of her rival for her employer's affections? Did Richard Careyhug the woman he publically announces that he hates? Is the French priest really who he pretends to be? And how many passings will occur before Poirot unmasks the cuddleer?