Local Author Talk on Murder & Mayhem in Montecito

Chaucer’s Books (3321 State Street, Santa Barbara) will host local author Steven Gilbar for a book talk and signing of his book “Montecito Noir: True Tales of Murder & Mayhem in Paradise” on Wednesday, May 8 at 6 p.m.

Book Description “Montecito Noir: True Tales of Murder & Mayhem in Paradise”

Steven Gilbar has been writing about Santa Barbara since 1979. In 2022 he turned his focus to Montecito, where he has lived for over forty years, to celebrate the many authors who have resided there. The following year he honored the actors who have called Montecito home. This book is quite different from the others, for murder and other malicious misconduct do not call for celebration or honor. Yet to judge by the number of “true crime” books and streaming tv about homicide there is a fascination about the ghastly business. So he wondered what mayhem had occurred over the years in his own “backyard.” And here you have it. A chronological look at the seamy side of this paradise by the sea.  Mr. Gilbar himself  has never been charged with a felony, save for crimes against the English language. -Courtesy of the Author

Author Biography –  Steven Gilbar  has lived most of his life in Montecito. In 1981 he decided to channel his love of reading into a book, and somehow was able to convince St. Martin’s press to publish “The. Book Book,” that would be the first of more than twenty shamelessly non-commercial volumes he would see published. (The meager royalties from these endeavors forced Gilbar back to lawyering of a couple of decades). He published several more “book books” before turning to local literary history with “Literary Santa Barbara” (1998) and “Published & Perished: Santa Barbara Writers Remembered” (2021). He founded Speaking of Stories, Santa Barbara’s “Page to Stage” theater and served on the board of directors off the Friends of the Santa Barbara Library. In 2022 and 2023 the wrote “little books” about Montecito’s writers and actors. -Courtesy of the Author