Elin Hilderbrand delivers the perfect summer beach read with The Five-Star Weekend. Who wouldn’t want to be invited by Hollis, an incredible chef with a food blog with many followers?! After the unexpected death of her husband, she invites four women from different times in her life. Her meticulously planned weekend at her home in Nantucket is to be filmed by her estranged daughter Caroline. All the women come together with secrets and baggage slowly revealed over the weekend. Past relationships come forward as Caroline interviews the attendees. Drama, forgiveness and healing are interwoven throughout the story. #TheFive-StarWeekend #ElinHilderbrand #NetGally

As a longtime reader of Elin Hildebrand, this novel did not disappoint. It is a beach read with depth and humor. We see Hollis, the protagonist, try to put the pieces together after her husband passes suddenly. I enjoyed the narration, as we saw shifts from Hollis’s POV to the other of the “five star” gals. Another five star read, for sure!

Elin Hilderbrand always delivers. The Five-Star Weekend is the perfect book for vacation or anytime really.
Hollis Shaw has a history with Nantucket. Her mother died when she was a toddler and she grew up with her father on the island. It was an idyllic childhood but as an adult life took her to the mainland and her family becomes summer residents. When Hollis husband is killed on island in a car accident and her world is shattered. Eventually she hears a story of a woman who invited the best friend from each era of her life to a girls weekend as a way to perhaps heal from her grief. This is the story or those friendships, their history and the best girls weekend .

This is the book you need on a cold winter's day!
Of course how can you not love Elin! A great casual read that leaves you with smiles.

Thank you for the advanced reader's copy.

Hollis has the perfect life, or so it seems to others. She has a beautiful house, a successful food blog, and a doctor for a husband. One day her world suddenly falls apart when her husband, Matthew, gets into a car accident and dies, leaving Hollis alone with her daughter, Caroline. She decides to host a Five-Star weekend, so she invites her closest friends from the different stages of her life for a weekend together. As all of her friends attend for the weekend, they learn a lot about each other and of course there's some drama.

I always look forward to Elin Hilderbrand's books and THE FIVE -STAR WEEKEND was another winner. I loved getting to know all of these characters. Everyone has some kind of issue going on currently in their life and I enjoyed how it all played out. This is the perfect book to read anytime of year, but especially during the summer. I enjoyed it and would love to visit Nantucket some day.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Little, Brown, and Company for my ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This review will be shared to my Instagram (@coffee.break.book.reviews) in the near future.

I always enjoy Elin Hilderbrand and thought this book had a bit more depth that some of the others I've read in the past. I will purchase a copy for our library and it will see quite a bit of circulation. I appreciate the ARC from NetGalley and the publisher.

Like putting on some fuzzy socks, Linderbrand's books are always fun, easy, and delightful. Five-Star Weekend did not disappoint. I enjoyed the touch of our few Nantucket locals in the story.

Elin Hilderbrand is one of my favorite authors. She is consistently good, her books are easy to read, and she appeals to all generations. It is great over the summer when my grandmother and I can read an Elin Hilderbrand book at the same time, and both equally love it! Her newest novel, The Five-Star Weekend, is another hit for me and will surely be a popular beach read this summer.

The Five-Star Weekend is similar to Elin’s past novels in that it takes place in the summer months of Nantucket. It focuses on the main character, Hollis Shaw, who is a food blogger that became famous over quarantine. At the beginning of the novel, her doctor husband is tragically killed in car accident. While she is grieving the loss of her husband, coming to terms with how their marriage was, and dealing with the complex relationship of her college aged daughter, she decides to do a “girl's weekend” at her summer house on Nantucket. She calls it the “Five-Star Weekend” where she will invite one friend from each period of her life- high school friend, college roommate, mom friend, and a virtual friend from her website. She has a five-star itinerary and will make sure her guests are spoiled with fancy food that will later be posted on her website. The storyline focuses on each of the five friends of Hollis too, and there are twists and turns throughout the novel that keep it entertaining.

There are so many aspects I loved about this book I do not know where to start. First is the concept of the five-star weekend and having a friend from each period in your life. This is a PERFECT idea for a bachelorette, even taking place in Nantucket! Elin always does a wonderful job describing the Nantucket setting, and I also loved the description of the foods they were eating as well. This is a heartwarming story that has a happy ending and gives you chills up until the last word. I will be rereading this book this summer on a beach and pretending I am part of the five-star weekend! I recommend this to anyone and am sure it will be flying off the shelves come June 13th. Easy 5 out of 5 stars!

I usually look forward to my summer Elin Hilderbrand read more than any other summer book, but to be honest this one left me wanting more. On one hand, i absolutely loved the premise-- a group of friends having a girls weekend on Nantucket (even if they aren't all really "friends'). I loved the callbacks and cameos to characters from other books and loved the tour we got of the island. This is such a big help in planning my friends and my 50th birthday trip to Nantucket! But the plot and the characters were just lacking. I'm not sure if it was because the narrator jumped around so much or because I just didn't bond with any of the characters, but I ultimately didn't really care what way their stories ended. I wasn't invested in all and i just felt like that was something atypical for a EH book.

When Hollis experiences loss she gathers her friends to help her through. One can't help but root for Hollis. She is an extremely likable character. This is an excellent story about friendship.

The character development in The Five-Star Weekend is well written. Each person, her childhood friend, her college roommate, her grown up best friend, and a mysterious fan from her blogging page, has their own dilemma to work through.

Elin Hilderbrand has once again created an enjoyable, Thank you to the publisher, NetGalley and Elin Hilderbrand for the ARC copy!

Elin Hilderbrand’s newest novel, The Five Star Weekend, is another hit. The author stays true to her writing style and plot lines. It slowly pulls the reader into the lives of five friends as they reconnect during a long weekend on Nantucket and each must sort through the drama in her life.

Hollis , a recent widow , decides to host a “five-star weekend” by inviting her best friend from each stage of her life. Her daughter, Caroline, comes along to film the occasion. As they gather for the girls weekend, each woman is fighting her own personal struggle. From grief to health problems to social media issues to identity struggles to infidelity, the reader is drawn into the personal drama of each woman.

A perfect quick and easy summer read, Hilderbrand fans will not be disappointed. This was probably one of my favorites by this author.

I almost didn’t want to read this because I know her career is coming to an end, but Elin Hilderbrand has written another perfect book! I loved all the characters and really felt connected to each one. They all represent strong women, and the idea to bring them together for a weekend was great! I actually wish it was for a week, so the book was longer. This is the perfect summer read! I am so lucky to leave close to Nantucket and can’t wait to see all the places described in person this summer! The 5 star weekend gets 5 stars from this reader!

With her signature summer style, Hilderbrand hits this one out of the park. Hollis, a well-known food blogger, brings four of her closest friends to Nantucket for a five-star weekend following the death of Hollis’s husband. What follows is a weekend full of delicious food, decadent cocktails, and page-turning drama.

Every time I crack open one of Elin Hilderbrand's new novels, I think that she can't possibly outdo herself...and every time she proves me wrong. Five Star Weekend is beyond a five star read. It has all of the ingredients that have become Hilderbrand's trademark: friendship, secrets, love and just the right amount of scandal.

Hollis has become an internet sensation with her amazing recipes and her Nantucket charm. When her husband unexpectedly dies, Hollis spends months reeling from the loss. As a way of healing, she organizes a five star weekend with her four closest friends from different stages of her life. Tatum, Dru-Ann and Brooke have all loved and supported Hollis throughout her ups and downs but Gigi is the only mystery guest. They met online and bonded over childhood losses and shared interests, but is there more to Gigi's story?

Five Star Weekend will make you laugh out loud, shed a few tears, and make you want to plan your own five star weekend...

What can I say that hasn’t been said already about what an Elin Hilderbrand novel does to me, and for me? The Five-Star Weekend is her twenty-ninth novel, and every year Elin Hilderbrand proceeds to craft a book that is light, airy, fresh, easy to read, quick, full of wit and sharp humor, and just makes me so damn happy to read…..while at the same, being so layered and full of fully fleshed out characters with so many relatable issues in their lives.

Her books get placed in a box and often written off as simply being a beach book; but they just do something to me every year when I read them, and for the last 5-6 years I’ve been lucky to enough to get them as ARCs, so my Februarys are always the time of year I look forward to most, when the typical reader has to wait til June for their summer to begin with Elin….my summer always starts early!

And this year’s novel was no exception, what she has crafted in The Five-Star Weekend is a deeply intimate portrait of grief, resilience, and the bonds of female sisterhood; all sprinkled with fun, food, music, and ofcourse, some time at The Chicken Box ;) (If you haven’t been to Nantucket or read an Elin Hilderbrand book, I’m sorry that you don’t get that final reference 😅)

Quintessential Hilderbrand beach read with drama, family/friend dynamics, and Nantucket as the backdrop.
I'm glad Hilderbrand got away from the ghost phase of her writing, as I didn't care as much for Golden Girl and Hotel Nantucket.
I liked Hollis and her group of friends. The relationship between Hollis and her daughter was realistic.
However, I really thought Brooke's "big reveal" was going to be about her having an eating disorder because she was constantly saying things about gaining weight, etc. "It's so delicious that she doesn't care if they have to roll her off the island in a wheelbarrow." For real though - it's bread, Just eat the damn bread on this free trip to Nantucket, for crying out loud! And Brooke asks Gigi "How do you stay so thin?"
I do feel Hilderbrand places too much emphasis on weight/having the perfect body in most of her novels. Although, I will give her credit for describing Hollis as "nobody's idea of thin...her bottom, although plump and round, is firm."
Really, though, I love Hilderbrand's books and Nantucket is on my bucket list because of her!

I am always thankful for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of an Elin Hilderbrand book. She never disappoints! The Five-Star Weekend was no exception. Hollis Shaw has what seems to be a perfect life. She has a popular food blog that has taken off in recent years, is married to a surgeon, and has a summer home on Nantucket, her hometown. Until one morning when she gets into an argument with her husband and he then dies that morning in a car accident. Hollis has so much guilt about their last conversation and focuses on the strain in their marriage lately. Her daughter pulls away in her own grief so Hollis is left feeling alone. After a few months she hears about a Five-Star Weekend so she decides to host one on Nantucket. One important woman from each phase of her life is invited. Unbeknownst to Hollis, each woman comes into the weekend with her own life complications. Tatum is waiting to hear the results of her biopsy to know if she has cancer, Dru-Ann's career is on the line, Brooke is getting ready to leave her husband, and Gigi is a stranger who Hollis met on her blog with secrets of her own. The five women come together for a weekend of pampering, secrets, and friendship.

I was excited to see another book by Elin Hilderbrand available, and The Five-Star Weekend did not disappoint. It was a heartwarming and hilarious book about the friendships between women and about the friendships we make at different stages of life. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Book Title: Five Star Weekend
Author: Elin Hilderbrand
Publisher: Little Brown and Company
Genre: Chick Lit- Beach Read
Pub Date: June 13, 2023
My Rating: 4 Stars

Hmmm the calendar states February, I know summer is right around the corner so it must be time for “The queen of beach reads” to release a new story.
I am a big Elin Hilderbrand fan; this is #23 for me and I am so ready to be transported to Nantucket.

Hollis Shaw is a Nantucket homegrown gal. She moved to Boston after college where she meets Matthew who is a Harvard medical School student. They marry in Wellesley and stay. She is the creator of a popular food blog – “Hungry with Hollis”. However when Matthew is killed in a one-car accident on his way to the airport, her life falls apart.
Seven month later she decides to celebrate living and invites four friends, from four different stages of her life, to spend a “Five Star weekend” with her at her home on Squam Road, Nantucket.
The four women are-
Best friend form her teens ~ Tatum McKenzie
Best Friend from twenties ~ Dru-Ann Jones
Best Friend from “prime of life” ~ Brooke Nirtlley
Best Friend now ~ Gigi Ling. (Someone Hollis only knows from her website never met in person. But we readers learn early in this story that Gigi knows Matthew! ~ Hmmm)

Story had me from page one!
Then it got weird I found these ladies unlikable and thought a weekend with them would be a total disaster!
I, of course, was curious as I am a big EH fan. And was anxious to find out how the weekend plays out.
Awww trust me it does get better!
Story is pretty much written in typical Hilderbrand style of chapters with repeated POVs but this time no Nantucket POV!
We do have the signature Hilderbrand playlist of old songs!
Love that characters from past stories make an appearance ~ Fast Eddie is mentioned.

I have a feeling we are going to hear more from ‘Blonde Sharon’ and her sister brunette sister Heather. Perhaps June 2024’s beach read.


Want to thank NetGalley and Little Brown and Company for granting me the pleasure of reading this early eGalley.
Publishing Release Date scheduled for June 13, 2023

I arrived only recently to the Elin Hilderbrand world of novels. I think I have now read 4 novels, including this most recent novel, The Five-Star Weekend. There are close to 50 Hilderbrand novels, but what I have already realized is that each novel is unique and without repetition. The Five-Star Weekend is a story about friendship, but is also a story of love and the relationships between wife and husband and between mother and daughter.

In The Five-Star Weekend, Hilderbrand creates 5 women, whose backstories are compelling and both sad and uplifting. As she has done in the previous novels that I have read, Hilderbrand tells stories about women that reveal the complexity of life, and how, within only a sentence, life can change. Hilderbrand captures the complexity of widowhood, and the moments of love and anger that can exist together in a cohesion that will surprise readers, who have not experienced that sort of loss. As is probably true for many Hilderbrand readers, I could see myself in several of these women. The sign of a fine writer is the ability to pull readers into a novel so completely that when the last page arrives, what the reader feels is acute sadness and loss that it is over. I suspect many readers will want to create their own five-star weekends.

I have begun slowly buying earlier Hilderbrand novels, especially as I find them on sale. I do heartily recommend The Five-Star Weekend. Although I am not providing spoilers, I can say with all honestly, I loved this story and all the stories within the novel. I want to thank the author and publisher for providing this ARC in exchange for my honest review. Thank you also to NetGalley for having introduced me to another fabulous writer.