About JJ Anselmo
John “JJ” Anselmo grew up in the heart of New York's Little Italy, coming
of age in the early ’60s. He has been a Staten Island resident for the past 50 years. He is a proud graduate of Stuyvesant High School and Columbia University, where he majored in civil engineering. He is still engaged on a part-time basis as a registered professional engineer, specializing in the design and construction of waterfront and coastal structures He rekindled his passion for creative writing about a dozen years ago.
The Newsstand, which is a coming-of-age novel set in Little Italy mostly in the ’60s, was his first novel. He recently completed his second novel, Moonlight Over Tuscany, which is primarily set at a cooking school in Lucca, Italy in 2014.
In addition to having a love of history, world travel and sports (particularly tennis), he along with his wife of over 50 years, Mary, are Italophiles, whose interest in all things Italian include the study of the Italian language and visiting Italy as often as they can -- 18 times to date. He is currently working on his third novel, Sicilian Sunset. He has been a member of the Greenbelt Recreation Center since it first opened.
Moonlight Over Tuscany
This is my newest novel, Moonlight Over Tuscany. Sex and romance intersect with murder at a Tuscan cooking school when an attractive 43-year-old American, an aspiring Italian cookbook author, becomes a prime murder suspect, fearing that she will become the next Amanda Knox!
A racy whodunit set in Lucca, Italy in 2014, which also transports the reader to various Tuscan towns and cities, as well as Naples and Sicily. A sampling of Italian recipes is included at the end of the book.
The Newsstand
This is my first novel, The Newsstand. It is about teenagers coming of age in the ’60s on the tough streets of New York’s Little Italy.
“Little Italy, New York: a place in my mind; a place in my heart. In writing this slice-of-life novel, I have endeavored to ‘recapture’ the essence, fabric and ethos of that famous – or as some might say, infamous – Italian-American enclave that existed in Manhattan about a half-century ago.”