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The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hilderbrand

Contemporary fiction

The Hotel Nantucket

by Elin Hilderbrand

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Quick take

In this new charmer from the modern master of beach reads, a plucky manager tries to teach an old hotel new tricks.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, Well_Known

    Famous author

  • Illustrated icon, Light_Read

    Light read

  • Illustrated icon, Supernatural

    Supernatural

  • Illustrated icon, Quirky

    Quirky

Synopsis

After a tragic fire in 1922 that killed 19-year-old chambermaid, Grace Hadley, The Hotel Nantucket descended from a gilded age gem to a mediocre budget-friendly lodge to inevitably an abandoned eyesore—until it’s purchased and renovated top to bottom by London billionaire, Xavier Darling.

Xavier hires Nantucket sweetheart Lizbet Keaton as his general manager, and Lizbet, in turn, pulls together a charismatic, if inexperienced, staff who share the vision of turning the fate of the hotel around. They face challenges in getting along with one another (and with the guests), in overcoming the hotel’s bad reputation, and in surviving the (mostly) harmless shenanigans of Grace Hadley herself—who won’t stop haunting the hotel until her murder is acknowledged.

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Get an early look from the first pages of The Hotel Nantucket.

The Hotel Nantucket

1. The Cobblestone Telegraph

Nantucket Island is known for its cobblestone streets and red-brick sidewalks, cedar-shingled cottages and rose-covered arches, long stretches of golden beach and refreshing Atlantic breezes—and it’s also known for residents who adore a juicy piece of gossip (which hot landscaper has been romancing which local real estate mogul’s wife—that kind of thing). However, none of us are quite prepared for the tornado of rumors that rolls up Main Street, along Orange Street, and around the rotary out to Sconset when we learn that London-based billionaire Xavier Darling is investing thirty million dollars in the crumbling eyesore that is the Hotel Nantucket.

Half of us are intrigued. (We have long wondered if anyone would try to fix it up.)

The other half are skeptical. (The place, quite frankly, seems beyond saving.)

Xavier Darling is no stranger to the hospitality business. He has owned cruise lines, theme parks, racetracks, and even, for a brief time, his own airline. But to our knowledge, he has never owned a hotel—and he has never set foot on Nantucket.

With the help of a local real estate mogul, Eddie Pancik—aka “Fast Eddie” (who, for the record, has been happily reunited with his wife)—Xavier makes the savvy decision to hire Lizbet Keaton as his general manager. Lizbet is an island sweetheart. She moved to Nantucket in the mid-aughts from the Twin Cities, wearing her blond hair in two long braids like the younger princess in Frozen, and at the start of her first summer on island, she found a “prince” in JJ O’Malley. For fifteen seasons, Lizbet and JJ ran a wildly popular restaurant called the Deck; JJ was the owner/chef and Lizbet the marketing whiz. Lizbet was the one who came up with the idea for the rosé fountain and the signature stemless wine glasses printed with the day’s date that became a social media phenomenon. Not all of us cared about Instagram, but we did love spending long Sunday afternoons at the Deck drinking rosé, eating JJ’s famous oyster pan roast, and gazing out over the shallow creeks of Monomoy, where we spied the occasional white egret fishing for dinner among the eelgrass.

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Why I love it

The days are getting warmer, the sun is shining longer, and the ice cream trucks have begun to make their rounds. But really, nothing says “summer is just around the corner” more than the release of a new Elin Hilderbrand novel. So cue up your beach party playlist and get ready for another warm-hearted, witty romp from Nantucket’s prolific novelist.

When a British billionaire buys the run-down Hotel Nantucket, hoping to transform it into a vacationer’s paradise, he has his eyes set on one prize: receiving a “five-key review” from a notoriously critical hotel reviewer. And he knows the surest way to accomplish this is to hire the smart and savvy Lizbet Keaton as general manager. There are just a few problems: Lizbet’s staff of quirky characters are far from experienced; the hotel’s years of dilapidation have earned it a pretty bad reputation; and, well, the hotel has a bit of a pesky ghost-with-a-grudge problem. Can Lizbet still pull it off?

The Hotel Nantucket boasts the ingredients of a great summer read: an amusing cast of characters, a lively setting, all the best interpersonal drama, and a little bit of flirtation to boot. And with an extra dose of supernatural antics, this novel will deliver for anyone looking for a satisfying page-turner to kick off the season.

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Member ratings (10,522)

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The Hotel Nantucket
Contemporary fiction
View all
The Last Love Note
What Does It Feel Like?
Anita de Monte Laughs Last
The Wedding People
Honey
The Leftover Woman
The Same Bright Stars
Bye, Baby
Swan Song
The Days I Loved You Most
The Connellys of County Down
Joe Nuthin’s Guide to Life
Jackpot Summer
Adelaide
The Collected Regrets of Clover
Again and Again
Evil Eye
Black Cake
Maame
Romantic Comedy
Someone Else’s Shoes
Once There Were Wolves
We Are the Brennans
The Bad Muslim Discount
What Comes After
Olga Dies Dreaming
Last Summer at the Golden Hotel
Monster in the Middle
Nine Perfect Strangers
The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany
The Girl with Stars in Her Eyes
Honey Girl
In Every Mirror She's Black
Yinka, Where Is Your Huzband?
Sankofa
The Unsinkable Greta James
The Love of My Life
The Five-Star Weekend
The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto
The Wishing Game
Behold the Dreamers
The Mothers
All the Ugly and Wonderful Things
Little Fires Everywhere
The Music Shop
Where’d You Go, Bernadette
The Reckless Oath We Made
Dear Edward
When We Were Vikings
The Girl with the Louding Voice
A Good Neighborhood
Big Summer
All Adults Here
Happy & You Know It
Friends and Strangers
The Comeback
True Story
The Last Story of Mina Lee
Troubles in Paradise
White Ivy
This Close to Okay
The Chicken Sisters
The Prophets
In a Book Club Far Away
The Other Black Girl
Apples Never Fall
A Quiet Life
We Are the Light
The Most Likely Club
The Fortunes of Jaded Women
When We Were Bright and Beautiful
The Hotel Nantucket