BOOK FESTIVAL
August 4, 2026
Photography by Joshua Bradford Gray, Charity Grace Mofsen, Tim Ehrenberg and Sara Divello
Featuring a star-studded lineup from all walks of the literary world, the Nantucket Book Festival was a sight to see. From bestselling author Ann Patchett, to The Today Show host Jenna Bush Hager, Kin author Tayari Jones and Buckeye author Patrick Ryan, the festival offered free events for every reader, with book talks at the Methodist Church, Dreamland, Nantucket Atheneum and the White Elephant.
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FOGGY SHEET
FOGGY SHEET
Interview by Paige Martino Photography courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association Long before Greater Light became one of Nantucket’s most beloved historic houses, it was an aging 18th-century cow barn tucked away on what was then Bull Lane. Where others might have seen a weathered farm building, Quaker sisters Hanna and Gertrude Monaghan envisioned something extraordinary, transforming the humble barn into an exuberant home and art studio layered with salvaged architectural treasures, handcrafted furnishings and original paintings. They called it Greater Light . A hundred years later, Beverly Hall keeps HannaMonaghan’s spirit alive, putting on period clothes and performing as Hanna at Greater Light. “My feeling when I walked inside [Greater Light] for the first time was almost visceral,” Hall said. “One day during the process, I just got so immersed I said, ‘That house just needs someone to bring it alive.’ I just said it. I blurted it out. ‘Someone needs to be Hanna.’ The whole group turned around and said, ‘Beverly, why not you?’” Becoming Hanna meant immersing herself in Hanna’s memoir, filling pages with underlined passages, colorful notes and thoughtful observations tucked into the margins. She interviewed people who had known Hanna and spent countless hours researching both the Monaghan sisters and Greater Light itself. Along the way, she began recognizing unexpected parallels between their lives, particularly in their shared devotion to faith and the arts. “The attraction was immediate,” Hall said. “[Hanna] really sparked something within me, so I took it and ran with it.”
Written by Brian Bushard Photography by Kit Noble While they may not be household names in the true Hollywood sense, Nantucket’s summer population includes powerful producers, screenwriters and editors who are behind the scenes on the movies we all recognize. Indeed, Nantucket has an underground entertainment community that is in effect a hidden Hollywood.“I got involved in the Nantucket Film Festival before we bought a house on the island,” said Marc Resteghini, a producer with Amazon MGM Studios who executive produced the series Young Sherlock. “As I started to learn a little bit more about the festival itself, I started to realize there were a lot of people who either lived on the island or vacationed here from the entertainment industry.” Resteghini was named the new chair of the film festival this June. While Nantucket has a reputation for attracting politicians and Wall Street titans, lesser known is the fact that dozens of leaders in the entertainment industry have also found Nantucket as their summer refuge, just not the names you might know. “It’s like Sergeant Pepper Lonely Heart Club Band,” actor John Shea said. “We see each other but the last thing we want to do is talk about the film business. It’s more of a quiet acknowledgement of a fellow traveler thana fellowship.” “The Vineyard is where all the actors and the writers go, the creatives,” documentary film producer Annabelle Dunne added. Dunne summers on Nantucket. “I think a lot of people that work in Hollywood come here to be with their families, relax and enjoy Nantucket, not to network. But it is a small island, and sometimes when you take away the work component and you say we’re just getting together to get together, then things can happen.”
Written by Jack Bradner Photography by Kit Noble
Written by Brian Bushard Photography by Kit Noble There are family vacations and there are family vacations. Some people take their kids to Disney World, some take their kids to a Caribbean resort. But Dan and Sarah Gault have taken family travel to an entirely different level. This August, the Gault family will take an 11-month trip of a lifetime from their house on Nantucket to 18 countries on three continents, traveling like vagabonds through Africa, Asia and Australia. Their four school-aged kids will join them for the entire length of the vacation, ditching the comforts of life on Nantucket for an education they would never receive in school. “On this trip, forget about watching a big screen TV,” Dan said. “We’re talking about things like clean drinking water and having electricity 24 hours a day. Showing them those things gives them perspective. It plants a seed in them for a lifetime.” The Gaults, by their own admission, are not ordinary travelers. Since their trip will take nearly a year, their four children—in eighth, seventh, fifth and third grade—will be homeschooled through a math and English curriculum, as well as a healthy dose of reading, journaling and cultural visits to museums and historical sites. Instead of a beach resort vacation, they’ll be in city centers and remote parks, immersing themselves in new cultures and languages. And since the children are growing—and taking up more space in their house on the island—the entire trip will coincide with a yearlong project to lift their house in Warren’s Landing, making more space for the family of six to spread out. For the time they’re gone, Sarah, a special education teacher at Nantucket Public Schools, will be on sabbatical and set to return for the 2027-2028 school year. Dan, who owns a property management company, handed the reins to his second-in-command for the time being. “My whole team stepped up to make this possible,” he said. “I was anxious to tell two groups of people—my employees, because I didn’t want them jumping ship, and my clients in the management world, because I didn’t want them to be upset. But they were maybe the most supportive.”