Don’t Even **Think** About Getting on Elin Hilderbrand’s Bad Side
The Queen of Beach Reads Has her Baddies’ Backs
Hold onto your duck-embroidered hats! There was a major fracas on Nantucket at the end of last year, and we’re just learning the details now (thank you TMZ.) From a party planner’s Dec. 6, 2024 Incident Report describing what happened at the Dreamland Stroll Party at the island’s film and cultural center, it seems that 24-year-old Jordon Hudson, the much younger girlfriend of 73-year-old football coach Bill Belichick, encountered unwelcome gestures on the dance floor! And if that wasn’t sufficiently horrifying, the gestures were coming from Belichick’s ex Linda Holliday, 62, and her dear friend, the prolific author of Nantucket-based fiction, Elin Hildenbrand, 55:
“[Dreamland executive director Alicia] Carney reported to me that she observed threatening body language and escalating aggression from Elin Hilderbrand and Ms. Holliday towards Ms. Hudson on the security footage and that Ms. Hudson was currently surrounded by three women. I approached the group on the crowded dance floor… and I noticed several people filming (including Ms. Holliday) a conversation with primarily Ms. Hilderbrand… Ms. Hudson attended the event with her friend Melissa Sapini, who is the current titleholder of the Miss Massachusetts pageant, and was identified by her crown and sash.”
How can this be? Elin Hilderbrand is a national treasure. She cranks out summer reads that evoke a cozy world where people take strolls along the sunset in Tory Burch flip flops. She writes novels about middle aged divorcees drinking goblets of crisp white wine and smiling to themselves as the ocean breeze whips against their cheeks and necks (which they start to feel less bad about). These women often end up making amends with their snotty college-age daughters and rekindling romances with their high school boyfriends. If they’re lucky, they’ll eventually get played by Nicole Kidman or Diane Lane in a Netflix adaptation.
The land of Elin Hilderbrand is littered with seashells and sail boats and tissue boxes featuring seahorse designs. But guess what… Elin has a dark side. She stings like a poisonous jellyfish, and burns like the midday sun. Especially if you mess with her friends, as was evidenced when she stormed over to Bill Belichick’s new baby-boo and told her to hit the road at a recent high society gala (whose Gen Z DJs, Ashley and Katie, were the twin daughters of Hilderbrand’s close girlfriend, Linda Holliday, aka Belichick’s ex). “It was very uncomfortable,” a source told People magazine. “There was a lot being exchanged between them. It was very aggressive behavior." (Elin’s pack of girlies even made Hudson’s friend Miss Massachusetts cry!)
From camera footage to police blotters, we combed the archives of the coastal enclave of Nantucket for other recent instances of the fierceness that Hilderbrand brings out for her baddies.
Bartlett’s Farm Market, May 7, 2025, 12:24 p.m.
Lynne Rodgers was about to grab the last arugula caper chicken salad sandwich in the ready-to-eat display at the gourmet market when Joe Cox Jr., of Cox Bros. Roofing Company, snatched the item out from under her. Security footage shows Ms. Hilderbrand, Ms. Rodgers’s lunch date, exchanging words with the hungry tradesman. Audio is unavailable but the pair became visibly agitated. Ms. Hilderbrand ultimately liberated the sandwich from Mr. Cox’s grasp by forming a fist and relying on a “pop up” move that she learned playing JV volleyball in Collegeville, Pa.
Wauwinet Luxury Resort, May 21, 2025, 4:06 p.m.
A blowsy guest at the wedding of the daughter of Howard and Jean Winnifrere was seen standing a little too close, for far too long, to the father of the bride. Ms. Hilderbrand, who belongs to Mrs. Winnifrere’s monthly Books & Baked Brie club, sidled over to where her friend’s husband was standing and “mistakenly” spilled her wild blackberry Aperol spritz all over the bosom of the guest’s sea green linen dress.
103 Wampanoag Way, May 27, 2025, 8:12 p.m.
Rye Cooper-Sendak, Donald Cooper and Madeleine Sendak’s 16-year-old daughter, signed on as a caterer at Stephen and Clarissa Van Hoofs’ annual surf and turf dinner party. She had the audacity to invite Luke Dubus, her deeply sketchy and horribly emaciated boyfriend, to meet her at the back of the Van Hoofs’ $16 million home for a “smoke break.” A protracted act of hanky panky got in the way of the mini lobster rolls making the rounds, and was recorded on one of the property’s high-end outdoor security cameras. Near the end of the passed hors d’oeuvres hour, Ms. Hilderband surprised the malingering lovebirds by climbing out of the second floor bathroom window and scaling down the side of the shingled manse and scaring them so badly with gestures of slitting their throats that they ran away screaming.
Erin Hielle, June 1, 2025, 4:54 p.m.
After a Sunday afternoon pickleball session, Ms. Hilderbrand popped into her favorite boutique to try on the kelly green Tuckernuck dress she’d seen in the shop window. The author had no more than ripped off her polo shirt when she overheard an unfamiliar voice talking disparagingly about Beatrice Sullivan, Ms. Hilderbrand’s neighbor and fellow gardener, who’d just had a facelift that didn’t take. Clad in only a La DoubleJ tennis skirt and extra support bra, Hilderbrand lunged out of the changing area and smacked the smack-talker on the head with her state-of-the-art pickleball racket.
Nantucket Town Hall, June 2, 8:31 a.m.
Security footage taken from the Broad Street Wyze Cam that Town Selectman Ned McGallagher personally installed shows a sinewy woman with blonde hair and dark sunglasses, later to be identified as Candace Bushnell - longtime nemesis of Nantucket author and Hilderbrand homey Lili Anolik - ascending the steps to Nantucket Town Hall. As this non-islander reached for the door, another blonde - this one in a tangerine tunic and old-timey aviator glasses - parachuted down from the sky and wrestled Ms. Bushnell to the ground. Ms. Hilderbrands’ hair extensions transformed into live snakes, and a look of sheer terror was seen on Ms. Bushnell’s buffed and bronzed face before it turned to literal stone. Ms. Anolik was awarded the New England Book prize at the Ladies of Nantucket luncheon that took place later that afternoon.