Christopher Castellani will read from his new novel, Leading Men.  “With echoes of Tender is the Night and The Sun Also Rises, Leading Men tells the extraordinary love story of Tennessee Williams and Frank Merlo. Castellani elegantly weaves together Merlo's final days with memories of a dramatic (and delicious) Italian summer in 1953 that changes his world forever. Throw in an aging Swedish actress, Truman Capote, Italian cinema and the staging (and script!) of a lost Williams play and you have all the ingredients for a literary page-turner.”—Hannah Tinti

Christopher Castellani is the author of A Kiss from Maddalena, The Saint of Lost Things, and All This Talk of Love and a book on writing, The Art of Perspective. He is the son of Italian immigrants, a Guggenheim fellow, and the artistic director of Grub Street writing center. He lives in Boston.