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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
emotional
funny
fast-paced
This was a super easy book that was set during Christmas in Nantucket. The story was nice and just what I needed to get into the Christmas spirit. I read the book in a day - it is an easy read.
The only thing that I didn't like was the book felt like it didn't have its own stand-alone ending. It is part of a series of four and will have a better ending in Book 4.
Recommend especially if you are reading during the holidays, but be aware that it is Book 1 of a 4 book series before you start reading!
The only thing that I didn't like was the book felt like it didn't have its own stand-alone ending. It is part of a series of four and will have a better ending in Book 4.
Recommend especially if you are reading during the holidays, but be aware that it is Book 1 of a 4 book series before you start reading!
Wasn't sure about this at first, but I enjoyed listening to this one. Will continue the series.
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Content Warnings
Minor: War
emotional
funny
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I’ve never read an author that uses more unnecessary exclamation points. I did not enjoy her style of writing.
Despite listening to her podcast (Books, Beach and Beyond) occasionally and hearing about her for years, I hadn’t read Elin (pronounced like Ellen) Hilderbrand (notice the r in the middle) before. So since Winter Street came up on a lot of best-of Christmas reading lists—and people love her—I bought a copy and settled in with it in early December. But Winter Street is not one of her best-rated. So perhaps I would enjoy another one of her books better? Because I wasn’t really impressed with this one. I found it cheesy and unbelievable, which is normally okay for this genre, but not—I thought—in an enjoyable way. I kept wanting to like it, but it never lifted off or peeled me away from my real life, nor was I impressed with the actual writing or plotting.
Kelley Quinn and his ex-wife Margaret have four grown children. Kelley runs a bed and breakfast on Nantucket Island, but right before the Christmas festivities, he catches his wife Mitzi kissing Santa Claus, and not in a cute way. The daughter still lives at home, and her relationship is falling apart. One of the sons still lives at home and he has a secret he’s not telling. The eldest does not still live at home but he has legal and family troubles. And the fourth son has been deployed to Afghanistan and gone silent just as there are several casualties there. It’s a hot holiday mess involving the entire dysfunctional family.
Can I just interject here that a male character named Kelley was super confusing to my brain? I know that it can be a male name (I knew a guy named Kelly when I was a kid), but with so many characters being thrown at me at the beginning of this book, it took a really long time before I was settled that the dad was the Kelley. Just sayin’.
Yeah, I am just fine with reading light and breezy books that have a whole lot less in the poetic and literary ways than some of the other stuff I read. I like a break. I like to be whisked off for a little easy fun sometimes. That’s what I thought would happen with Hilderbrand and with Winter Street. Not so much. Sure, Winter Street was written better than Book Club Hotel, but this one didn’t really take me anywhere I wanted to go with people I really wanted to spend time with. The hotel wasn’t very cozy and the situations weren’t at all funny and the romances had almost zero sizzle. I was stuck with serious and “crazy,” and I’m not sure this was the right writing style for that. Maybe that’s always how Hilderbrand writes, and it’s just not for me. Unknown.
Maybe Winter Street’s not meant to be cozy at all, more like a Jodi Picoult or a Lessons in Chemistry kind of women’s literature. But no. It didn’t sit that way with me at all. Maybe I’m just confused. What did I just read? I didn’t love it, that’s for sure.
The New York Times called Hilderbrand “the bard of Nantucket and the doyenne of flip-flops, outdoor showers and pink sunsets” (Elisabeth Egan, “The Essential Elin Hilderbrand,” May 2021). And her books are “escape hatches for serious readers, bridges between mothers and daughters, cat’s cradles connecting friends. They’re beach reads with undertow” (ibid). So maybe I’ll have to try again with The Perfect Couple (which is also now a streaming series on Netflix) or with Summer of ’69 because it takes place on Martha’s Vineyard, especially if (when?) I am visiting the Institute of Creative Writing again. Those books also get slightly better reviews than her Winter Series.
The Winter Series is:
Winter Street
Winter Stroll
Winter Storms
Winter Solstice
Obviously, I am not going to be reading on in the series. But there are many who do. If you are into Winter Street, it would make sense to spend the next few holiday times reading the rest of the series, all snuggled up with a cup of tea next to the lit Christmas tree.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
I find it very fascinating that Hilderbrand has an MFA from Iowa. An MFA from Iowa is like writing royalty, like a blessing from the high fairy godmother of literature, and quite frankly, you don’t usually see these grads going on to write beach reads and only beach reads. I kinda wonder what her story is and how she managed to buck the Iowa paradigm.
Most of the time, Elin Hildebrand writes Nantucket beach reads. Many of them follow the same characters, so many people read them chronologically, though I’ve heard that her writing improved over her career. She also had the podcast I mentioned above and is a mom and beach lover who lives in Nantucket. She also has a clothing and gifts brand based on her novels.
Her books are:
(They are broken into the Paradise and Winter series and the main series, which she calls “Summer” on her website.) They don’t have to be read in any order, technically.
The Beach Club (2000)
Nantucket Nights
Summer People
The Blue Bistro
The Love Season
Barefoot
A Summer Affair
The Castaways
The Island
Silver Girl
Summerland
Beautiful Day
The Surfing Lesson
The Matchmaker
Winter Street (Winter #1)
The Rumor
Winter Stroll (Winter #2)
Here’s to Us
Winter Storms (Winter #3)
The Identicals
Winter Solstice (Winter #4)
Winter in Paradise (Paradise #1)
The Perfect Couple
Summer of ‘69
28 Summers (28 Summers #1)
What Happens in Paradise (Paradise #2)
Troubles in Paradise (Paradise #3)
Golden Girl
The Hotel Nantucket
The Five-Star Weekend
Swan Song (2024)
Hilderbrand just retired from writing, and is concentrating on being a “book influencer.”
QUOTES:
“It’s time for actual self-improvement, which will start with bravery, and an abandonment of his bitterness” (p69).
“It had all been a golden dream, Margaret thought. If only they had realized it at the time” (158).
“You can give birth to a beautiful, perfect human being but requited love isn’t guaranteed for her—or for any of us” (p165).
“What a person does isn’t the same as who a person is” (p224).
MOVIES AND SHOWS:
No movie for this one, though there is a play by Justin Cerne.
***REVIEW WRITTEN FOR THE STARVING ARTIST BLOG***
Kelley Quinn and his ex-wife Margaret have four grown children. Kelley runs a bed and breakfast on Nantucket Island, but right before the Christmas festivities, he catches his wife Mitzi kissing Santa Claus, and not in a cute way. The daughter still lives at home, and her relationship is falling apart. One of the sons still lives at home and he has a secret he’s not telling. The eldest does not still live at home but he has legal and family troubles. And the fourth son has been deployed to Afghanistan and gone silent just as there are several casualties there. It’s a hot holiday mess involving the entire dysfunctional family.
Can I just interject here that a male character named Kelley was super confusing to my brain? I know that it can be a male name (I knew a guy named Kelly when I was a kid), but with so many characters being thrown at me at the beginning of this book, it took a really long time before I was settled that the dad was the Kelley. Just sayin’.
Yeah, I am just fine with reading light and breezy books that have a whole lot less in the poetic and literary ways than some of the other stuff I read. I like a break. I like to be whisked off for a little easy fun sometimes. That’s what I thought would happen with Hilderbrand and with Winter Street. Not so much. Sure, Winter Street was written better than Book Club Hotel, but this one didn’t really take me anywhere I wanted to go with people I really wanted to spend time with. The hotel wasn’t very cozy and the situations weren’t at all funny and the romances had almost zero sizzle. I was stuck with serious and “crazy,” and I’m not sure this was the right writing style for that. Maybe that’s always how Hilderbrand writes, and it’s just not for me. Unknown.
Maybe Winter Street’s not meant to be cozy at all, more like a Jodi Picoult or a Lessons in Chemistry kind of women’s literature. But no. It didn’t sit that way with me at all. Maybe I’m just confused. What did I just read? I didn’t love it, that’s for sure.
The New York Times called Hilderbrand “the bard of Nantucket and the doyenne of flip-flops, outdoor showers and pink sunsets” (Elisabeth Egan, “The Essential Elin Hilderbrand,” May 2021). And her books are “escape hatches for serious readers, bridges between mothers and daughters, cat’s cradles connecting friends. They’re beach reads with undertow” (ibid). So maybe I’ll have to try again with The Perfect Couple (which is also now a streaming series on Netflix) or with Summer of ’69 because it takes place on Martha’s Vineyard, especially if (when?) I am visiting the Institute of Creative Writing again. Those books also get slightly better reviews than her Winter Series.
The Winter Series is:
Winter Street
Winter Stroll
Winter Storms
Winter Solstice
Obviously, I am not going to be reading on in the series. But there are many who do. If you are into Winter Street, it would make sense to spend the next few holiday times reading the rest of the series, all snuggled up with a cup of tea next to the lit Christmas tree.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
I find it very fascinating that Hilderbrand has an MFA from Iowa. An MFA from Iowa is like writing royalty, like a blessing from the high fairy godmother of literature, and quite frankly, you don’t usually see these grads going on to write beach reads and only beach reads. I kinda wonder what her story is and how she managed to buck the Iowa paradigm.
Most of the time, Elin Hildebrand writes Nantucket beach reads. Many of them follow the same characters, so many people read them chronologically, though I’ve heard that her writing improved over her career. She also had the podcast I mentioned above and is a mom and beach lover who lives in Nantucket. She also has a clothing and gifts brand based on her novels.
Her books are:
(They are broken into the Paradise and Winter series and the main series, which she calls “Summer” on her website.) They don’t have to be read in any order, technically.
The Beach Club (2000)
Nantucket Nights
Summer People
The Blue Bistro
The Love Season
Barefoot
A Summer Affair
The Castaways
The Island
Silver Girl
Summerland
Beautiful Day
The Surfing Lesson
The Matchmaker
Winter Street (Winter #1)
The Rumor
Winter Stroll (Winter #2)
Here’s to Us
Winter Storms (Winter #3)
The Identicals
Winter Solstice (Winter #4)
Winter in Paradise (Paradise #1)
The Perfect Couple
Summer of ‘69
28 Summers (28 Summers #1)
What Happens in Paradise (Paradise #2)
Troubles in Paradise (Paradise #3)
Golden Girl
The Hotel Nantucket
The Five-Star Weekend
Swan Song (2024)
Hilderbrand just retired from writing, and is concentrating on being a “book influencer.”
QUOTES:
“It’s time for actual self-improvement, which will start with bravery, and an abandonment of his bitterness” (p69).
“It had all been a golden dream, Margaret thought. If only they had realized it at the time” (158).
“You can give birth to a beautiful, perfect human being but requited love isn’t guaranteed for her—or for any of us” (p165).
“What a person does isn’t the same as who a person is” (p224).
MOVIES AND SHOWS:
No movie for this one, though there is a play by Justin Cerne.
***REVIEW WRITTEN FOR THE STARVING ARTIST BLOG***
Cute, easy read with likeable characters. A little predictable but I enjoyed it enough to want to read book #2 in the series!