Philip Kukielski

Philip Kukielski is a journalist-turned-historical-author who learned the art of narrative non-fiction in the course of a decades-long career in daily newspapers. He spent most of his journalism career working as a writer, content editor and, ultimately, a managing editor at The Providence Journal. The inspiration for his book on the 1983 invasion of Grenada came from a cover story he wrote for the paper’s Sunday magazine on a heroic Marine from Rhode Island who was among the 19 U.S. servicemen killed in the week-long fighting. Later, as an editor, Kukielski oversaw award-winning feature writing by others at the paper. He was the principal assigning and content editor for narrative stories judged the best non-deadline newspaper writing in the nation in an annual contest sponsored by the American Society of Newspaper Editors. His Grenada book draws on his experience as both a writer and editor. It's written in an accessible journalistic style, but footnoted to a scholarly standard. The narrative is largely sourced to freshly declassified oral histories and military after-action reports that were made available to Kukielski under federal public disclosure law and presidential order. His documentary research at military libraries and civilian archives records was supplement by his own one-on-one interviews. Grenada veterans shared dramatic accounts of heroic acts that were required to make up for the operation's many organizational shortcomings.