The Filbert Steps is an atmospheric, character‑driven mystery set against the iconic stairways of San Francisco’s Telegraph Hill. With quiet tension, layered prose, and a protagonist who notices everything, Lila Blake delivers a story that feels both intimate and expansive;  a neighborhood mystery with literary depth. About the Book Vivian Salvatore returns to Telegraph Hill with a cat, a divorce settlement, and a book she can’t seem to write. At fifty‑two, she’s rebuilding her life one morning walk at a time, surrounded by familiar neighbors and the comforting illusion that everyone knows everyone. But when she discovers a powerful developer dead on the Filbert Steps, the police are quick to call it an accident. Vivian, with twenty‑seven years of reading teenagers’ faces for a living, knows better. A coat buttoned wrong. A cigarette stubbed out where it shouldn’t be. Storefronts quietly sold to a post‑office box in Delaware. And a neighborhood full of people who had reason to wa...