Chaucer’s Choices 

The midtown bookstore goes local for author events on three successive days to mark the end of the month, beginning Sunday, Feb. 26, with Shaunna and John Stith’s Black Beach: A Community, an Oil Spill, and the Origin of Earth Day. With Earth Day 2023 barely a month away, the Stiths’ first children’s picture book uses fictional schoolgirl Sam to trace the 1969 oil spill off our coast that sparked a new wave of environmental activism…

Monday, Feb. 27, brings Ichak Adizes Ph.D., the developer of Organizational Therapy, who has advised Fortune 100 companies and leaders of countries. After publishing 25 books, Adizes has penned a personal memoir called The Accordion Player: My Journey from Fear to Love. The book reveals how the author has learned to see challenges as opportunities for growth, from a childhood marked by imprisonment in a Nazi concentration camp to his career as a thought leader who aids organizations in creating a culture of trust and respect…. 

On Tuesday, Feb. 28, Jarrell Jackman, who worked for the Santa Barbara Trust for Historic Preservation for 35 years as project administrator and CEO, talks about his new book Santa Barbara’s Royal Presidio, giving the historical property its due alongside the Mission and the Courthouse. Jackman chronicles the Presidio’s adobe construction and its place as the last Spanish fort founded and built in Spanish North America, in the process honoring the community that came together to ensure its preservation and faithful reconstruction. Details for the free signing events at www.chaucersbooks.com/event.