Elin Hilderbrand books in order

Mack Petersen has been working as manager of The Beach Club for 12 summers. This summer is however unlike any other as his boss, Bill Elliot, arrives at the hotel in the spring with a new list of demands.

As though that’s not enough, Mack’s girlfriend, Maribel, is insisting that they get married while Vance, the African-American bellman who has never stopped despising him ever since he stole his job 12 years ago, threatens him in a public altercation; with Jem Crandall, the bellman, develops feelings or Maribel.

Emotions will reach a boiling point when a hurricane threatens to wash away The Beach Club.

Kayla, Antoinette and Val have for the last two decades performed their own special summer ritual. Once every year, the old friends substitute their daily, separate lives for one under the Nantucket stars where they drink champagne, tell stories and swim naked.

On one of those summer nights however, one of the three friends swims out from the shore and never returns.

Having overcome the grief, the surviving friends realize that their loss stretches way beyond them when a layer of secrets begins to emerge.

What has kept their friendship firm now has the power to destroy their marriages, families and even themselves.

The Newton family takes refuge in their beloved home on Nantucket every summer for three months of sunshine, cookouts, and bonfires on the beach. This summer however couldn’t be any different.

Arch Newton, a renowned New York attorney, losses his life in a plane crash while returning home from a business trip.

Despite all the grief, Beth, his stunning widow, decides to uphold their summer family tradition while also fulfilling a promise that Arch made before his death.

So she invites Marcus, the son of her late husband’s most challenging client, to spend the summer with them.

Emotions will surface when Marcus and Beth’s teenage twins, Winnie and Garrett, learn of loss, first love and treachery.

Adrienne Dealey has for the better part of the last six years worked for hotels in exotic resort towns.

Left completely broke by her ex-boyfriend, her desperation for money this summer lands her in Nantucket.

Thatcher Smith, owner of Nantucket's best restaurant, offers her a job, although Adrienne isn’t sure she can handle it being that she has no restaurant experience.

But when Thatcher gives her a crash course in the business, the two immediately develop an instant attraction.

The challenge however is that about Fiona, the Blue Bistro's chef, seems to steal Thatcher's attention on time without number.

Adrienne has to decide whether she will open her heart for the first time, or move on as always.

Marguerite Beale, once a chef of culinary hub Les Parapluies, has been out of the public limelight for well over a decade. This however changes when she receives a phone call from her goddaughter, Renata Knox.

The two haven’t met since Candace Harris Knox, Renata's mother, passed on fourteen years earlier.

While visiting the family of her new fiancé in Nantucket, Renata uses the chance to contact Marguerite in a bid to lean about the life and death of her mother—something her father forbid.

But when the events of the day take a twisted and hopeless turn, nothing will end up as planned!

Three women, burdened with small children and apparent emotional issues, arrive at the Nantucket airport tarmac one hot summer day.

Vicki is still trying to digest the news of her serious illness while her sister Brenda no longer has a job after being caught having an affair with a student.

Melanie, their friend, is finally pregnant after seven failed in vitro attempts—only to find out that her husband is cheating on her.

The three have as such come to Nantucket to escape, relax and enjoy the sun; until they meet twenty-two-year-old Josh Flynn.

This is the story of marriage, infidelity, tragedy and the madness of motherhood.

“No phones, no television and no distractions.”

Like any other mother of a bride-to-be, Birdie Cousins is obsessed with the grand wedding of her daughter Chess.

From the floating dance floor in her Connecticut back yard to the color of the cocktail napkins, she struggles to control the excitement and chaos ahead of the big day.

But when Chess suddenly calls late in the night announcing the cancelation of her engagement, it marks the beginning of a terrible summer; with worse news arriving soon after.

Taking a break from the first romance since the recent end of her marriage that lasted for three decades, Birdie summons for the help of her younger daughter Tate and her own sister India.

The four women then head to Tuckernuck Island in an effort to escape their troubles.

“Who would you run to if your life fell apart?”

Meredith’s perfect life came crumbling down when her husband was arrested for defrauding everyone they knew out of millions.

Hunted by the press and rejected by society, Meredith knows that she can only turn to one person, her childhood best friend Connie.

But the fact that the two haven’t spoken in years makes Meredith suspicious when her old friends invites her to her holiday home.

What are Connie's real intentions? Who is the person photographing the two women? Is Meredith hiding something about her husband's dealings?

Before the end of the summer, everyone's lives will have changed beyond their wildest dreams.

The students of Nantucket High have gathered for a bonfire on the beach for a local tradition one warm summer evening.

What however began as a graduation night celebration quickly escalates to tragedy following a terrible car crash that kills Penny Alistair, the driver, while her twin brother is left in a coma.

Whereas the other passengers like Jake, Penny's boyfriend, and her friend Demeter are physically unharmed, the emotional damage becomes too much to bear.

So many questions as to what happened before Penny took the wheel are left unanswered.

As the summer stretches on, there will be plenty of shocking truths, dark secrets, broken promises and shattered hearts.

Margot's feelings for her husband Drum are quickly dwindling.

While on a family vacation in Nantucket, she sees the chance of reigniting the spark through one Hadley Axelram, Drum’s ex-girlfriend.

As such, she arm-twists her surfing-god husband into making plans for a surfing lesson with Hadley and her son, with the hope that jealousy will help rescue her marriage.

Will she reignite the spark when she sees her husband spending time with Hadley, or will she come to the realization that her marriage is truly over?

This is a moving short story of a wife and her fading marriage.

The Carmichaels and the Grahams have descended on Nantucket for a blissful wedding that will bring the two families together.

The wedding plans are aloft; all being done in accordance to the wishes of the bride's late mother who described everything about the future wedding of her youngest daughter on The Notebook.

Whereas it seems as though everything is going as planned, things are actually falling apart in reality.

In the days before the wedding, feelings will be questioned, scandals will surface and hearts will be shattered.

This is a story of marriage, faithfulness and how we choose to fulfill our commitments.

Ever since Clendenin Hughes first kissed Dabney Kimball in high school freshman year during a Nantucket snowstorm, their chemistry has been one to die for. The two are basically the same person in different bodies.

Distance however comes between them when Dabney goes to Harvard while Clen heads to Yale.

Determined to bridge the 140 mile distance, Dabney goes to New Haven during the Harvard-Yale game; even borrowing a sexy black outfit from a classmate.

But upon her arrival at tailgate, she learns of Clen’s new romantic connection with the beautiful Jocelyn.

Dabney has to do something about it, for she would be lost without the bond she has with Clen.

48-year-old Dabney Kimball Beech is considered the best matchmaker there is in Nantucketer. Some consider her ability magical while others, like her economist husband John Boxmiller Beech, and daughter, Agnes, brand it as meddlesome.

Her results however speak for themselves, as all 42 coupled she has matched are still together. The only time her romantic instinct didn’t work was a long time ago when a handsome boy named Clendenin Hughes stole her heart then left.

Now that Clen is back on the island after 27 years, Dabney must face her true feelings and use her gift in the midst of tragedy.

Madeline King couldn’t have had a worse time to be hit by a writer's block. A Nantucket writer, she is overwhelmed by a looming deadline, compounding bills, and limited inspiration. Her best friend Grace is however preoccupied with remodeling her garden with the help of a good-looking landscape architect.

Grace however finds herself in a dilemma; caught up in a decision that will irreversibly change her life. Could her dilemma be Madeline's saving grace?

As the gossip blows up, the two women will desperately try to uncover the truth; a truth that could possibly be worse than the rumor.

Deacon Thorpe is a charismatic celebrity chef who married three women; Laurel Thorpe, Belinda Rowe and Scarlett Oliver. Other than the fact that they all love him, the three women hate each other passionately.

So when Deacon shockingly dies at a dilapidated summer cottage in Nantucket, his unsettled family gathers there to not only bid him goodbye but also fulfill his last wish.

Will the family however survive in a cottage where Laurel, Belinda, and Scarlett all made different memories with Deacon?

Will they for once forget their differences and raise a glass in honor of Deacon, in his most beloved place on earth?

Harper and Tabitha Frost may be twin sisters but the two are as distant as can be. The distance between Nantucket Martha's Vineyard is only eleven miles, yet the twins haven’t spoken to each other in more than a decade.

When the twins however switch islands and lives in a desperate effort to save their splintered family, they soon learn that they could never quite outrun the secrets, betrayal and gossip of the past.

Can Harper and Tabitha forget the past and finally end their sibling rivalry?

The year is 1969, and times are changing for the Levin family.

Unlike every year, the children won’t be spending the summer at their grandmother’s home in downtown Nantucket due to various reasons.

Blair, the oldest sister, is stuck in Boston as she is expecting twins while middle sister Kirby has taken a summer job on Martha’s Vineyard.

With Tiger, the only son, deployed to Vietnam as an infantry soldier, thirteen-year-old Jessie is left feeling like an only child.

But as the summer progresses, Ted Kennedy sinks a car in Chappaquiddick, man flies to the moon, and the Levin family face their own fair share of challenges just like the rest of America.

Welcome to the most explosive summer of the twentieth century.

Vivian Howe, a Nantucket novelist and mother of three, loses her life after being run over by a car while jogging near her home.

Ascending to the Beyond, she is placed under a Person named Martha, who grants Vivi the opportunity to watch the summer events from above.

She’s also given three “nudges” to change the fate of events on earth.

But her children all have different problems.

Willa is having her third miscarriage, Carson is partying recklessly, and things aren’t good between Leo and his extravagant girlfriend.

Furthermore, a dark secret from Vivi’s last novel could destroy her reputation.

And when shocking revelations emerge, Vivi’s loved ones will have to solve their shortcomings, with or without a nudge.

Fresh off a bad breakup with a longtime boyfriend, Nantucket sweetheart Lizbet Keaton is desperately seeking a second act. 

When she’s named the new general manager of the Hotel Nantucket, a once Gilded Age gem turned abandoned eyesore, she hopes that her local expertise and charismatic staff can win the favor of their new London billionaire owner, Xavier Darling, as well as that of Shelly Carpenter, the wildly popular Instagram tastemaker who can help put them back on the map.

And while the Hotel Nantucket appears to be a blissful paradise, complete with a celebrity chef-run restaurant and an idyllic wellness center, there’s a lot of drama behind closed doors. The staff (and guests) have complicated pasts, and the hotel can’t seem to overcome the bad reputation it earned in 1922 when a tragic fire killed nineteen-year-old chambermaid Grace Hadley.

With Grace gleefully haunting the halls, a staff harboring all kinds of secrets, and Lizbet’s own romantic uncertainty, is the Hotel Nantucket destined for success or doom?

After tragedy strikes, food blogger Hollis Shaw gathers four friends from different stages in her life to spend an unforgettable weekend on Nantucket.

Hollis Shaw’s life seems picture-perfect. She’s the creator of the popular food blog Hungry with Hollis and is married to Matthew, a dreamy heart surgeon. But after she and Matthew get into a heated argument one snowy morning, he leaves for the airport and is killed in a car accident. The cracks in Hollis’s perfect life—her strained marriage and her complicated relationship with her daughter, Caroline—grow deeper.

So when Hollis hears about something called a “Five-Star Weekend”—one woman organizes a trip for her best friend from each phase of her life: her teenage years, her twenties, her thirties, and midlife—she decides to host her own Five-Star Weekend on Nantucket. But the weekend doesn’t turn out to be a joyful Hallmark movie.

The husband of Hollis’s childhood friend Tatum arranges for Hollis’s first love, Jack Finigan, to spend time with them, stirring up old feelings. Meanwhile, Tatum is forced to play nice with abrasive and elitist Dru-Ann, Hollis’s best friend from UNC Chapel Hill. Dru-Ann’s career as a prominent Chicago sports agent is on the line after her comments about a client’s mental health issues are misconstrued online. 

Brooke, Hollis’s friend from their thirties, has just discovered that her husband is having an inappropriate relationship with a woman at work. Again! And then there’s Gigi, a stranger to everyone (including Hollis) who reached out to Hollis through her blog. Gigi embodies an unusual grace and, as it happens, has many secrets.

Alice and Tom have reunited for the last twenty-eight summers to reignite their intense love affair that began decades ago.

Being married to different partners hasn’t stopped them; neither have their busy schedules and happy families, as the two have managed to keep their love alive and under wraps.

Nothing however lasts forever.

Tom's wife is hogging all the headlines for her controversial and increasingly popular campaign for political office, while Alice has received a diagnostic report that casts a dark shadow over her future.

Although their love has survived through the years, could their twenty-eighth summer be very well their last together?

A postscript to the #1 New York Times bestseller 28 Summers – Jake McCloud returns to Nantucket for Labor Day weekend 2023, this time without Mallory. 

Inspired by the title Dorothea Benton Frank planned for her next book—Reunion Beach—these close friends and colleagues channeled their creativity, admiration, and grief into stories and poems that celebrate this remarkable woman and her abiding love for the Lowcountry of her native South Carolina—a land of beauty, history, charm, and Gullah magic she so brilliantly brought to life in her acclaimed novels.

From Elin Hilderbrand, #1 New York Times bestselling author, a sequel to Summer of ’69.

From Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author, comes a heartwarming, humorous interview from the hereafter with Pat Conroy and Dorothea Benton Frank, two beloved icons of Southern literature.

From Patti Callahan, bestselling author of Becoming Mrs. Lewis and Surviving Savannah, comes The Bridemaids, a story about a trip to the South Carolina beach.

From Mary Alice Monroe, New York Times bestselling author, Mother and Child Reunion, a heartwarming story set under the warm South Carolina sun.

Reunion Beach also features letters, short stories, poems, and essays from:

Mary Norris, New York Times bestselling author and staff writer for The New Yorker

Cassandra King Conroy, bestselling and award-winning author of Tell Me A Story

Nathalie Dupree, James Beard Award-winning cookbook author

Marjory Wentworth, former Poet Laureate of South Carolina

Gervais Hagerty, author of In Polite Company

Jacqueline Bouvier Lee, Peter Frank, Victoria Peluso, and William Frank

Infused with Dorothea Benton Frank’s remarkable spirit, Reunion Beach is a literary homage and beautiful keepsake that keeps this dearly missed writer’s flame burning bright.

In SUMMER DAYS AGAIN, Elin Hilderbrand offers nine delectable stories—prequels, sequels, and "missing chapters" from her cherished books—some of which have never been published, until now.

Inside the collection, you'll find:

• Three years after Mallory Blessing’s death (in 28 SUMMERS), her friends gather for another eventful Labor Day celebration on Nantucket in “The Sixth Wedding.”

• The marriage at the heart of BEAUTIFUL DAY enters uncertain territory when Margot Carmichael encourages her husband to reunite with his ex-girlfriend in “The Surfing Lesson.”

• In “The Tailgate” the weekend of a Harvard/Yale football game recharts the course of “MATCHMAKER” Dabney Kimball’s first—and abiding—true love.

• In “Summer of ‘79," the three Levin sisters reunite after a decade after the summer that changed everything.

• And more…

Claire is a workhorse who wants it all, even though according to her friends, she has it all—a committed husband, four beautiful children and a great career as an artist.

So when she accepts to chair the committee for the biggest social event of the year in Nantucket, Claire is convinced she can handle it.

But when planning the gala, she crosses paths with billionaire Lock Dixon.

When the two occasionally begin working together over a bottle of wine, emotions are sparked. And to her surprise, Claire likes how the butterflies make her feel.

Soon enough, the gala and her life will be swerving out of control.

The MacAvoys, Kapenashes, Drakes, and Wheelers are four of the most prominent couples in Nantucket.

They are not just the best of friends but rather good neighbors to each other and solid pillars of their tightly held community.

But right before they mark the start of another peaceful summer in Nantucket, Greg and Tess MacAvoy are killed when their boat capsizes during an anniversary sail.

As the summer heat begins to blaze and the island weeps over the loss, nothing could possibly prepare the MacAvoy's closest friends for the next revelations.

It is wedding season in Nantucket and the Otis-Winbury union has every prospect of being a memorable occasion; with the groom's rich parents splashing money to host an extravagant ceremony at their oceanfront estate.

When a body is however discovered in Nantucket Harbor a few hours before the ceremony, Chief of Police Ed Kapenash leaves nothing to chance as everyone soon becomes a suspect.

As Kapenash interviews the bride, the groom and even a member of his own family, he soon learns that couples are far from perfect—even in a wedding.

This enthralling story will once again prove why Elin Hilderbrand is the queen of the summer beach novels.

Irene Steele couldn’t have asked for a better life. She is married to a husband who passionately loves her, and the two live in a stunning Victorian house in Iowa City.

Everything however changes one cold New Year night when she receives the shocking news of her husband’s death in a plane crash. Her husband, who was supposed to be on a business trip, has been killed on the Caribbean island of St. John.

When Irene and her sons arrive at the getaway paradise, they will make more shocking discoveries about the man who they once thought they knew.

Even more challenging is that they must come face-to-face with truths about their family, and their own futures.

Irene Steele was handed the shock of her life about a year ago when her beloved husband—an accomplished businessman and father to their grown sons—was killed in a helicopter crash. Even more disturbing is that he had led a double life on the island of St. John, loved too by another woman.

Back on the island however, Irene and her sons are determined to get to the bottom of the strange life, and death, of a figure they thought they knew.

Through the process, they’ll discover shocking truths about their own lives and futures.

As Irene Steele begins getting comfortable in the St. John villa where her deceased husband once led a double life, her life is soon disrupted after a visit from the FBI.

It turns out that Russ was more of a stranger than Irene thought.

As she and her sons try to establish their new lives, daunting evidence reveals that the helicopter crash that took the life of her husband could very well not have been an accident.

With a storm gradually building in the Atlantic, the secrets and lies that brought Irene and her sons to the Caribbean island will soon be exposed.

Other than being the owner of Nantucket's Winter Street Inn, Kelley Quinn is the proud father of four. His grown children are however facing various challenges.

Patrick, the eldest son, is a hedge fund manager with an unsettled conscience.

Kevin, a bartender, is secretly sleeping with Isabelle—a French housekeeper named.

Ava, a school teacher, has found the perfect guy who is however not ready to commit.

Bart, the youngest and only child of his second marriage to Mitzi, has shockingly enlisted for the Marines.

When Kelley finds Mitzi making out with Santa Claus at the inn's annual party, his ex-wife Margaret Quinn could very well be the one to save Christmas.

Kelley Quinn, owner of Nantucket's Winter Street Inn, pens a holiday letter to his friends and family as he reflects on the year that has been. The family now seemingly has much to celebrate.

Presently single, Kelley is on friendly terms with Margaret, his first wife, while their son Kevin has an adorable new baby called Genevieve. Even Ava, their daughter, is finally getting it right in the dating scene.

But just when the Quinns are looking forward of Genevieve's baptism and the traditional Christmas Stroll, Mitzi—Kelley's former second wife—shows up.

Jealousy and passions will be over the roof as both old and new lovers gather under the mistletoe.

Enter the Quinn family.

Mitzi has returned while Patrick is on the verge of being released from prison. Kevin, who now has a blossoming new business, is ready to exchange vows with Isabelle, while there is promising news from Afghanistan regarding Bart.

Trouble is however never too far away from the Quinn family. Kelley just survived a health scare while Jennifer is losing her fight with drug addiction. Ava on the other hand can’t decide which of the two lovers she wants to be with.

Despite all the upheavals, one thing is for certain; when Christmas comes, you can always run back home!

Some time has passed since the entire Quinn family spent the holidays under the same roof.

When Bart however returns home safely from Afghanistan, the Quinn family prepares for one of the biggest holiday celebration in recent memory.

Even better is that Kevin is now married to Isabelle, and Ava looks to have at long last found the man of her dreams.

With Patrick also finding purpose after getting out of prison, Kelley Quinn is a happy man now that his entire family has been peacefully reunited.

But would a Quinn family reunion for the holidays end so smoothly?