Writing about midcentury America, whether that’s in the form of novels or a coffee-table book about one of the country’s most famed restaurants, has allowed me to indulge in my abiding love of that particular era, which was filled with glamour, intrigue, and a sense of possibility. There’s always another story to tell.

The Lost Letters from Martha’s Vineyard

Mariner; 2024

In the summer of 1959, rising Hollywood ingenue Mercy Welles is on the cusp of stardom when she vanishes without a trace. Almost 60 years later, Kit O’Neill, a young television producer in New York, is stunned to discover that her recently deceased grandmother, the woman who raised her, was, in fact, Mercy Welles. As Kit embarks on a journey to uncover the truth about what happened that fateful summer, long-forgotten correspondence offers a window to the past that reveals the shocking secrets that forever changed Mercy’s life—and may also change Kit’s.

“Callahan skillfully blends notes of mystery and romance in this layered story of family secrets. Readers will have a hard time putting it down.” —Publishers Weekly

“A layered, spellbinding beach read with plot threads that could have come from Jane Austen and Nancy Drew, Peyton Place and The Bridges of Madison County.” — Vanity Fair

The Night She Won Miss America

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 2017

In 1949, Betty Jane Welch is guilted by her mother into entering the Miss Delaware contest, where her surprise win soon lands her in the midst of the glittering Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City. There she meets and quickly falls for her striking escort, local scion Griffin McAllister. When Griff convinces her to impulsively run away with him, the chase is on as the cops, a cunning socialite, and a reporter secretly in love with the beauty queen all embark on a hunt from Atlantic City to New York to Newport for the missing couple—one that threatens to expose Griff’s darkest secret.

“Inspired by a true story, this delightful novel is like an old black-and-white movie translated to the page, perfectly capturing the era as it serves up breathless romance and a heart-pounding plot.”—People Magazine (Pick of the Week)

“Callahan nimbly guides the reader from the rounds of the Miss America competition to Times Square to a climax on a seaside cliff during a masquerade ball. The Night She Won Miss America is a delightfully dramatic and fast-paced summer read, with just the right amount of darkness to balance out the fluff.”—BookPage 

Searching for Grace Kelly

Mariner; 2015

In the summer of 1955, Laura is a Connecticut beauty from Smith who wants to be a writer. Dolly is a student at the Katharine Gibbs secretarial school who wants to find a husband. And Vivian is a vivacious cigarette girl at the famed Stork Club who just wants to sing. As the trio become unlikely friends when they are thrown together within the walls of the storied Barbizon Hotel for Women in New York, they each must navigate a path of love, betrayal, and hope to find happiness—and, perhaps, themselves.

“The New York of the 1950s shines through Callahan’s pages. His characters’ breathless excitement with their new lives pulls you into that time and place, and his deft plotting holds you there.”   —New York Times Book Review

“[A] deliciously stylish, retro first novel. . .As each woman becomes entangled with mysterious, even dangerous men, Callahan suavely combines literary finesse and pulp fiction to create a fast-moving, heartwrenching tale of romance and tragedy in a time of tyrannically sexist social conventions.” —Booklist 

The Musso & Frank Grill: Some Place to Eat

Story Farm; 2019

Commemorating the 100^th anniversary of the oldest restaurant in Hollywood, this sumptuous coffee table book tells the famed establishment’s colorful history—from its humble founding to the stars who ate here, the writers who boozed here, and the magic that is still made here—in prose and gorgeous photographs, accompanied by recipes of its most famous dishes.

“This treasure of a book is an appropriate tribute to the legendary restaurant—filled with fascinating stories about its celebrity clientele and red-jacketed staff, and as oversized and filling as its signature flannel cakes.” —Forbes