Former Bronx resident and retired naval officer George Vercessi loves the borough so much he set his latest novel, King of the Hill, here. His characters inhabit Westchester Square and Morris Park of the 1950s and 60s.
Vercessi set the historical crime caper in the Bronx and Washington D.C. It runs from the 1950s through the early 1970s. The novel is based on the notion that organized crime will one day plant a man in the White House and that the man won’t know it until they hand him the bill.
Kings of the Hill features a 1950s organized crime boss who makes calls the borough home and focuses on the man’s surreptitious plot to reshape a national crime syndicate. He visits several spots that older Bronx residents will recognize, such as a diner that resembles Jack’s Diner in Westchester Square, Vercessi said.
The Westchester Square el train station also pops up, as does the #6 IRT train. Vercessi references the Hunts Point, Middletown Road, Zerega Avenue, Buhre Avenue and Pelham Bay Park 6 train stops. He also incorporates a funeral parlor based on one near Westchester Square.
Vercessi mined his roots to pen his four novels, he said. King of the Hill opens in the east Bronx, before the action shifts to Washington D.C.
The crime boss in the novel steals vast sums of money when he embeds software in key government computer programs. He then uses the money to undermine his peers. The story twists and turns to the pinnacle of organized crime in America. The characters are pure fiction, Vercessi said.
Vercessi attended P.S 108 and P.S 83, and graduated from Monsignor Scanlon High School. His father, Peter Vercessi, a longtime civic leader in Morris Park active in the Republican Party, helped organize the Sons of Italy and the Little League of the Bronx. Peter Vercessi also founded the Bronx Park Blood Bank and the Bronx Day Program at the 1964 World’s Fair.
In 1989, George Vercessi ended a 27-year Navy career as Chief of Public Information for NATO’s Southern European command, headquartered in Naples, Italy. He earned many military and civilian awards and commendations, among them the highly coveted Public Relation Society of America’s Silver Anvil Award for his work on environmental issues when stationed in San Diego.
Since then, Vercessi has completed four novels and a guide for authors who wish to publish on the Internet.
Until 1996, Vercessi’s mother lived in the house that he was raised in, on Hering Avenue between Van Nest and Pierce avenues in Morris Park. He remembers playing as a child where Einstein Hospital sits today. Vercessi returns to Morris Park for reunions nearly every year.
King of the Hill is published by AuthorHouse.com, available at (888) 280-7715.
Reach reporter Patrick Rocchio at 718 742-3393 or procchio@cnglocal.com