James Vescovi’s stories about his eccentric grandparents have appeared singly in The New York Times, Alimentum Journal: The Literature of Food, Creative Nonfiction, Newsday, Gazetta Italiana, and various anthologies. The collection is called Eat Now; Talk Later: 52 True Tales of Family, Feasting and the American Experience. He is also author of The USS Essex and the Birth of the American Navy (Adams; 1999; 13,000 copies sold). His fiction and essays been published in Midwestern Gothic, Calliope, The New York Observer, the Georgetown Review, and Natural Bridge. He teaches at high school English and lives in New York with his wife and three children.