Photos by Carolina Pinto
David K. Randall, author of “The King and Queen of Malibu: The True Story of the Battle for Paradise,” held a book-signing session at the Surfboard Room in Payson Library on Monday to talk about his most recent book. Around 70 people attended the event, including members of the Malibu community, staff, faculty and donors.
Randall is also a New York Times bestselling author and a senior reporter at Reuters. “The King and Queen of Malibu: The True Story of the Battle for Paradise” is a historical fiction novel, published March 2, about the history of Malibu, focused on the love story of Frederick and May Rindge, the main characters of the book.
Pam Dexter, a member of the Malibu community, said she was very interested in Randall’s book because of where the story takes place.
“I haven’t read the book,” she said. “I thought it was really interesting and I came to learn more about the history of Malibu.”
Randall said he had several inspirations when writing this book, but his major ones were his own background and Malibu’s history.
“My major inspiration was growing up in Southern California and realizing that there was a lot of history that I had never known about,” he said. “It seems like all of the LA history was forgotten after 1940 or so.”
Liza Peterson, who lives in Malibu, said she is acquainted with Randall and attended the event to get books signed and support the author.
“We got to read the story before it got published, so I was aware that the [book] was happening,” she said. “I wanted to hear the talk, and I thought it was amazing. His extensive research was incredible.”
Randall is currently writing another historical fiction book about “a race to save the city” of San Francisco, and he said he will continue writing more after that.
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