Summerland: A Novel Mass Market Paperback – July 30, 2013

Usually Elin Hilderbrand writes women's contemporary fiction that has, in general, a happy tone. However, Summerland, it quite different from the other novels of hers that I have read. To be quite blunt it is tragic. The story opens in June on the graduation night for Nantucket High. 4 friends, who are juniors have gathered together to join their senior friends at the senior graduation parties. Penny and Hobby Alistair are twins. Penny is popular for her beautiful singing voice and actually sang the National Anthem at the graduation service earlier in the evening. Her twin brother, Hobby, is an all star athlete in football and baseball. Each of them very popular in their own right. Jake Randolph is also a popular athlete and the serious boyfriend of Penny. Demeter Castle is sort of the 4th wheel of the group. She is a troubled girl. She is overweight, doesn't have many friends, and seems to be on the brink of becoming an alcoholic. Her friendship, at least in Demeter's eyes, is a forced friendship based on the fact that all three of the families parents are friends so she thinks that the parents make the other kids be her friend because the adults are friends.As the night goes on the boys and Demeter continue to drink and party hop with Penny at the wheel as designated driver. But at the last party something happens that upsets Penny to the core. All anyone knows is that Demeter asks Penny to go the bathroom with her and when they get back Penny is a wreck. What could have happened to change Penny's mood so drastically? Penny decides to drive everyone home since they have all been drinking but both Jake and Hobby are worried about Penny's state of mind. Penny is speeding and not slowing down. As she continues to accelerate everyone in the car begins to worry. They beg her to slow down but she is now flooring the car. Soon the road is about to end at the beach dunes and Penny shows no signs of slowing down. The next thing the teens know is that the car is in the air and flipping. The consequences are not good. This isn't a spoiler since it is on the book flap but Penny ends up dead. Her brother Hobby is airlifted to Mass General Hospital in a coma with 14 broken bones and head trauma. Jake and Demeter are unhurt. Now the families are left to deal with the fall-out and each family deals with the consequences quite differently.Jake's family is already falling apart after the death of his 8 week old brother due to SIDS 4 years earlier. His mother, Ava, has distanced herself from the family and has moved into the nursery and spends her time either grieving her lost son or fighting with her husband, Jordan, who owns and runs the local paper. Demeter's family doesn't realize that their daughter is a brutal alcoholic who steals bottles of alcohol from residents homes during her working hours as a landscaper. Zoe, Penny and Hobby's mother, shuts herself off from all of her old friends to focus on Hobby and his healing and dealing with the loss of her daughter.Hilderbrand writes these complex characters with a deft hand. She certainly knows what she is doing when she writes these multi-faceted, layered characters like a professional. I was impressed that she could create such complete characters. She also writes with compassion. She pulls the readers feelings right out of them so our emotions are laid bare right there next to the characters that we are reading about. She deals with the theme of loss with grace and even know she has to show the bad side of a character she still makes them worth empathy.Hilderbrand really took a chance to take a step away from her typical writing and she pulled it off brilliantly. I highly recommend this book! 4 stars!

This book book hit home for me. Memories simillar. Very painful but a great read. I had a simillar experience in high school.

I wasn't sure I was going to enjoy this book as much as others of Elin's that I've read, but I did.It took me a little longer to get into it but once I had, I couldn't put it down. I even read through dinner!

This Nantucket-set novel about the aftermath of the death of a beloved local teen, who perishes in a graduation-night car accident, is the very definition of a beach read; both in tone and setting. A more benign version of PEYTON PLACE, this is a glimpse into small-town life, and the secrets everyone is hiding, or at least trying to. From the almost ethereally beautiful and talented Penny, whose life is lost at 17, to her superstar sports hero twin brother, Hobby, Penny's boyfriend Jake, their childhood companion, the unpopular and desperately unhappy, Demeter. The group of teenagers, friends since preschool and now bonded by the shared tragedy, along with their equally angst-ridden parents, serve up plenty of twists and turns that shock, but still ring true enough to lend credence to the novel's characters.Don't get me wrong, this is undeniably soapy stuff. But SUMMERLAND is also compellingly written and hard to put down. The very definition of a page turner, SUMMERLAND deftly walks the fine line between provocative and salacious. The characters are well drawn enough to elicit empathy for their various plights, even when they act abominably. You often hate what they're doing, but the actions, and reactions, are rooted enough to feel real and give the fast-paced plot much-needed grounding.This isn't a deep, meaningful read, but it's throughly entertaining and, not in a cheesy "guilty pleasure" sort of way, but more in a good, well-written, beach-read fashion. Personally, I finished it in a single session. It's my first Elin Hilderbrand book, but I'll be seeking out more by this author.

Nantucket conjures up enduring images. Author Hilderbrand paints a picture of "rolling surf, cobblestone streets," along with brick mansions, beach bonfires, corn with herbed butter, seersucker dresses, and endless cocktail parties. It is "a summer playground for those with a certain prep-school, old-money" pedigree, a community protected by privilege and fortified by gin and tonic. It is also a place "Where tragic things sometimes happened."Hilderbrand has written over twelve chick/beach lit novels with titles including All The Summer Girls, The Love Season, and Barefoot. Summerland is her most recent and if one is expecting a light beach read choose another book. This is a departure from her earlier works of romance and renewed relationships. It is a darker turn resembling a Jodi Picoult outing.In this idyllic setting of Nantucket lives are to be changed. Lies and secrets lead to a horrible incident impacting the sensitive balance within and between three families. It also impacts the community so the author has that collective represented as a single character reacting to, and commenting on, events as they unfold. As a device it works very well but the main draw are the characters. They start out as stereotypes but these damaged parents and their troubled teens are revealed to be much deeper indeed.In Summerland, Nantucket is a "fantasy of American summertime", a place of lunches, parties, tournaments, and fundraisers running on social currency. It is put to the test as all people and places are when things change. But especially summer places where sameness is not only comforting, it is expected. This is not your average fun beach read so perhaps save it for the fall when you can consume it along with several scotches.

I've read a lot of books by this author and love the descriptions of Nantucket and the story lines which appeal to my summer reading tastes. However this is so different; it's grey and dismal all the way through, at least that how it seems to me. A car accident leaves one passenger dead and another in a coma and we begin to experience the shock waves through the friends and family and how their stories intertwine. Some may enjoy this approach, but I got bored with the story and never really got to know the characters ( who were only lightly drawn). Very disappointing.

A story of love and tragedy, of good parenting and of not so good. The characters could be in a soap opera. The ending all neatly put together, but still left me with a feeling that none of them could in anyway be real true to life people.

I really enjoyed this, the story and pace. I was just a little disappointed at the end because it wrapped up a bit too soon for me.

Excellent book to relax into.

Good story but this author is a good storyteller. Always enjoy her books. Like the fact that she tells story from different characters perspective. Good read