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A BOY THEY ALMOST GAVE UP ON
They once told a seven-year-old Mexican-American boy in Waco, Texas, that he was “mentally retarded” and would never learn very much. He grew up to become a critically acclaimed journalist, historian, and author searching through the hidden emotional histories of America.
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Leaving L.A., Will the Last Person Here Turn Out the Lights?
Any new LA Metro security forces are overwhelmed. There is a literal scourge of drugs, crime, homelessness, filthy, stinking people, one of those filthy long-term homeless ladies with a reeking cat in a cage and a huge pile of basically trash, and it’s horrifying.
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L.A. IN THE SHADOW OF RUBEN SALAZAR
I HAD BEEN IN LOS ANGELES only a few days when the pressures placed on Chicano journalists in this city first began to settle on me. Fittingly, it happened in a bar at the Ambassador Hotel, where I was living at the time, not far from the pantry where Robert F. Kennedy had been assassinated.
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THE GIRL FROM THE BLACK SAND BEACH
THERE ARE MOMENTS from a reporter’s life that do not fade into memory so much as sink into the bloodstream. Forty-four years ago this month, I was living at the Hotel Camino Real in San Salvador with a woman named Estela. At least that is the simplest way to tell the story. The truth is…
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THE LAST MARGARITA OF THE CALIFORNIA DREAM
Lucy’s El Adobe was never just a restaurant. It was a California illusion people collectively agreed to believe in. A place where politics and celebrity and journalism and romance and Mexican food all blended together beneath soft light while outside, beyond the margaritas and stories and music, time quietly kept moving.
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MY LIFE BREAKING THROUGH TO THE OTHER SIDE WITH JIM MORRISON
IT’S AMAZING WHAT can happen when you live right off the Sunset Strip. About 15 years ago on a warm balmy December night, I was in my living room of my apartment, watching a movie on my laptop when suddenly a breeze blew into my window. I was startled and then inexplicably began to say in…
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RANDY NEWMAN: WHY I WROTE ‘I LOVE L.A.’
There are few songs that echo in L.A. quite like Newman’s winking civic anthem, which manages to be both sunny and subversive at the same time with its “big nasty redhead” cruising the boulevard. “Hey,” Newman protested, “I meant ‘nasty’ in the very best sense of the word.”
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Murder on the Metro, LA’s Dangerous Orient Express
With the LA Metro system now staffed with an array of guards — from police to armed security to ambassadors — riders can definitely feel more self-assured while jumping on and off.
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COUNCILWOMAN NITHYA RAMAN CHALLENGES BASS IN MAYOR’S RACE
Los Angeles City Councilwoman Nithya Raman entered the race for mayor Saturday, challenging incumbent and political ally Karen Bass hours before the noon deadline for candidates to file paperwork for the June 2 primary.
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LARRY MCMURTRY: THE ‘MINOR REGIONAL NOVELIST’ WORTHY OF THE NOBEL PRIZE
‘Terms of Endearment’ followed ‘The Last Picture Show’ with great fanfare, but it was his Pulitzer Prize-winning ‘Lonesome Dove’ that cemented his legacy as one of America’s best writers The list of Texans that have spent their writing lives chronicling their roots is rather long and impressive, and includes names like Dobie, Webb and Graves.…
LA Monthly
The National Magazine of Los Angeles