I am a twin. I am not, however, an “identical”; I’m a “fraternal.” I have a twin brother named Eric Hilderbrand. Our mother named me Elin (pronounced “Ellen”) but spelled it in this unusual way, causing forty-seven years of confusion, because of our Swedish ancestry… and because she wanted my name to be perfectly symmetrical with my twin brother’s name. Eric and I have always been very close, but I have chosen to dedicate this novel to all of my siblings. We are a blended family of five, together since 1976. After Eric and me in the order comes my stepbrother, Randall Osteen (“Randy,” “Rand,” “the Bean”), who is absolutely one of the greatest guys in the world, despite early-warning signs that he would be troubled (he was a fan of the Quebec Nordiques, he refused to eat cranberry sauce with “can indentations,” and don’t get me started on the galoshes he chose to wear during the infamous Hilderbrand family Easter egg hunt). Rand is my usual partner in crime at Jazzfest in New Orleans, so we have secrets from the rest of the family. After Randy comes my stepsister, Heather Osteen Thorpe. Heather is my biggest champion, my loudest cheerleader, my everyday best friend. Did we dress up as ducks and perform roller-skating shows in the basement? Yes. Did I take her to fraternity parties at Johns Hopkins when she was fifteen years old and the standing president of SADD? Yes. No matter how low I get, I know I will never sink, because I have Heather. She is my buoy and my light. At the end of the line is my brother Douglas Hilderbrand, the youngest and most sensitive of us all. Doug reads all my novels and will nearly always call me crying when he finishes because the emotional terrain I choose to write about resonates profoundly within him. He has also been known to cry over certain Dan Fogelberg songs.
I could not have handpicked four finer human beings to have shared my childhood memories with: digging the hermit crab pools, badminton games, collecting beach glass and scallop shells, fighting for the outdoor shower, executing the old “round the apple tree” play in family games of football, home movies, writing letters to Santa, orchestrating elaborate ploys to get out of church, watching The Love Boat, blaring Foreigner’s “Hot Blooded” in the car—and years later, throwing our first parents-aren’t-home party (the details of which will remain in the vault for at least another decade, but I’ll say this: it involves cigars ground up in the garbage disposal). As adults, my siblings are not only exemplary citizens and my closest friends, they are also remarkable parents—collectively, of ten children. We lost our captain—my father—when all of us were in the midst of adolescence, but not one of us veered off course. Our relationship with one another set a solid, even foundation that we were able to build our respective lives upon.
I could never have written this novel without the generosity and open-mindedness of the people of Martha’s Vineyard. Of special note is the police chief of Oak Bluffs, Erik Blake. Erik answered hundreds of questions for me over the course of fifteen months; my debt of gratitude to him is enormous and eternal. I want to also thank Erica McCarron a.k.a. the “Tiny Baker,” Steve Caillhane, Mark and Gwenn Snider, Liza May Cowan, and all of the members of the Facebook group “Islanders Talk.” I had thought that as a Nantucket novelist writing about the Vineyard, I might be looked at askance—but nothing could have been further from the truth. Over the course of the past year and a half, I have a brand-new love, understanding, and appreciation of Martha’s Vineyard and all the wonderful, generous, thoughtful people who live there.
A third location in this novel—one more deeply explored in the extra chapter entitled “The Country Club,” about Billy Frost meeting Eleanor Roxie in 1967 (available in certain editions of this book)—is Beacon Hill in Boston. I spend six weeks each fall living on Beacon Hill, and I would like to thank the people who make it feel like home: Paul Kosak and Anouk van der Boor, Julie Girschek, Michael Farina, Nina Castellion of E. R. Butler, Tom Kershaw of the Hampshire House, my barre buddy Liz King, Jennifer Hill from Blackstone’s, and Rebecca, Laura, and Brie of Crush. (I revise… and I also do a fair amount of shopping.)
As I’ve told you countless times before, my editor, Reagan Arthur, is an actual genius. She runs the company, Little, Brown, that publishes me, and she still finds time to be the editor of my dreams and take nature photos for Instagram. My agents, Michael Carlisle and David Forrer, are devoted to the happiness and well-being of Elin Hilderbrand the novelist and of Elin Hilderbrand the person—for this, I could not love them more; they are the finest gentlemen in the business. Special kudos to my killer publicity team of Katharine Myers and Alyssa Persons, as well as other super important people at Hachette: Peggy Freudenthal, Terry Adams, Craig Young, Matt Carlini, Andy LeCount, and the legendary Michael Pietsch.
And then there’s my home team. I feel silly repeating the names year after year, but I can’t live, write, or smile without the following people: Rebecca Bartlett, Debbie Briggs, Wendy Hudson, Wendy Rouillard, Margie and Chuck Marino, Anne and Whitney Gifford, Richard Congdon, Elizabeth and Beau Almodobar, Evelyn and Matthew MacEachern, Heidi and Fred Holdgate, Norm and Jen Frazee, Jen and Steve Laredo, John and Martha Sargent, Dave and Laura Lombardi, Manda Riggs, David Rattner and Andrew Law, Shelly and Roy Weedon, Helaina Jones, MKF, the Timothy Fields, big and small, and Ginna, Paul, and Christian Kogler. Also, the entire staff of the Nantucket Hotel deserves mention because it is, without doubt, my home away from home, and large portions of this novel were written by the pool there.
Beth Boucher, you get your own few lines: I’ve had superlative nannies in the past (Za, AV, Steph, Sarah, Erin), but you took on a job more daunting than theirs because of the incendiary ages of my children last summer (sixteen, fourteen, ten). Who wants to keep track of a sixteen-year-old boy? Nobody! A fourteen-year-old boy? Absolutely nobody! Thank you, Beth. You kept them alive, you kept them content, you kept them engaged. They preferred you to me—which is, of course, the whole point of hiring a nanny.
Lu Machiavelli: You are a flower-box maven! I don’t even know what those flowers are in Eleanor’s windows, but they sound outrageous!
Finally to my children, Maxwell, Dawson, and Shelby: This is both a thank-you and an apology. Writing two novels a year requires discipline and solitude, neither of which is optimal for parenting three busy kids. This past year there were balls dropped, games missed, tempers lost, and meals repeated week after week (as Dawson likes to say, You always make the same three things!). But please know that with every word I write, I honor the three of you as well as the incredibly beautiful island on which you are growing up. I am lucky for so many reasons—but mostly I am lucky to have three smart, talented, healthy, and thriving children like you.