Former Orange County Register reporter Thanhha Lai "spent 15 years grinding away at a sprawling novel she could never quite get right. So, five years ago, she turned her creative energies to a verse novel about a single year in her childhood as a Vietnamese émigré."

They paddled out Sunday by the hundreds in Huntington Beach to chill for a few moments of silence in memory of pioneering wave forecaster Sean Collins — followed by a ritual splashing of water and cheering that could be heard from shore.

Senior communities are being changed from the inside by aging baby boomers. Headline for the Orange Coast magazine cover story: "Sexagenarians, Drugs and Rock 'n' Roll."

Sean Collins, a self-taught wave forecaster who changed the way that surfers find out where to take their boards, died yesterday after collapsing of a heart attack while playing tennis in Orange County.
Fans are invited to today's 11:30 a.m. press conference at the stadium in Anaheim where the Angels will show off the newest SoCal megastar.
Reporter Mona Shadia, who was born in Egypt, has been assigned to write a weekly column about living as a Muslim-American in Orange County for the three Times Community News papers.
Arellano moves up from managing editor after the resignation, effective Dec. 2, of editor Ted Kissell.
Tony Ortega, the editor of the Village Voice, is speaking today at his alma mater, Cal State Fullerton
A new study from the Center for Health Reporting at USC says flatly that when the Big One hits Southern California, "hospitals won't be ready."
On Monday, the Register's general manager, Michael E. Henry, was named interim publisher.
It's one of the first times – if not the first time – that prosecutors in Orange County have charged an on-duty police officer with murder, the Register says.
Former Laker Javaris Crittenton was taken into custody tonight at John Wayne Airport in Orange County after checking in for a Delta Air Lines flight to Atlanta.
The Orange County city is under fire from the budget-slashing wing of the Republican establishment, writes Tad Friend.
The Huntington Beach home owned by former Bell city administrator Robert Rizzo is back on the market.
Dr. Kenneth Litwack, 71, suffers from bouts of confusion and checked himself into a Tucson clinic, then turned up missing.
The Huntington Beach home of indicted former Bell official Robert Rizzo hit the multiple listings database last week.
The con man has been sentenced back to prison, and his journalist partner in short-selling stock on companies they "exposed" does PR for the city of Costa Mesa.
Shawn Hubler writes in her Orange Coast magazine column that she senses more openness toward Orange County from her Los Angeles friends.
The independent bookstore on Ocean Avenue, open since 1996, will close by the end of summer.
Ruben Vives, once illegal, got a green card and a college job at the L.A. Times. Then he got his chance at being a reporter.
Tribune, MediaNews Group, and private-equity firms Gores Group and Plaitnum Equity are all said to be circling with Thursday's deadline to bid on Freedom Communications, the Wall Street Journal reports.
With Dean Singleton looking to step down, there could be a merger coming between his MediaNews and Freedom Communications.
Rizzo brought too much heat for obscure Orange County museum.
KOCE president and CEO Mel Rogers still can't quite believe that his little Orange County station that nearly went off the air a few years ago has suddenly become the public broadcasting powerhouse of Southern California.
Fear of conspiracies is woven deeply into the American identity, but especially in Orange County.
Orange Coast magazine comes up with 52 reasons why life in Orange County is better than life in Los Angeles.
Arellano ascends from staff writer at the OC Weekly.
The Orange County bazillionaire does not owe his out-of-wedlock children any money, a jury decides. Mark has been following the case at LA Biz Observed....
The Orange County Register is going all the way, decreeing that reporters and columnists shall have new mug shots taken that will run with every story.
An important figure in the Los Angeles book world has died. Marylin Hudson co-founded the legendary and long-running Round Table West book and author program.
With the Downtown Los Angeles pressroom overworked, the Los Angeles Times has quietly sent crews back to Costa Mesa to fire up the recently shuttered Orange County presses. There are...
The giant printing presses off the 405 freeway in Costa Mesa that were a key part of the Los Angeles Times' failed plan for West Coast domination have run for the last time.
OC political blogger Jon Fleischman wonders if talk about tearing down the West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center to accommodate an NFL stadium shoots in the foot Mayor Villaraigosa's attempt to lure the big Comic-Con convention away from San Diego.
The Orange County Local News Network was a partner of the Los Angeles Times, working out of the Times' offices in Costa Mesa and doing hyper-local coverage.
Much chortling in Orange County, apparently, after Vanessa Bryant showed up at last night's Lakers game wearing a shirt with the political slogan "Do I Look Illegal?
Last night at the literal eleventh hour an email went out to all Register staffers postponing a big meeting planned for this morning. Eventually, the news was allowed to break. The newspaper's parent company has reemerged from bankruptcy, but with new owners.
Voice of OC, by some veteran Orange County journalists, plans to concentrate on hard news.
Now 54, the doyenne of Los Angeles punk band X — called by Robert Hilburn "not just one of the greatest female rockers, but one of the greatest musical figures, period" — still does shows and lives quietly in Orange County. Scott Martelle profiles Cervenka in Orange Coast magazine's April issue.
OC Weekly staff writer Nick Schou's new book is "Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and Its Quest to Spread Peace, Love, and Acid to the World."
The editor's memo says the hard time aren't over, but that things are looking up.
Pakistan now says the American it arrested recently is not Adam Gadahn, the Al Qaeda spokesman from Orange County, but Abu Yahya Mujahideen Adam of Pennsylvania....
AP is reporting that the Southern Californa-bred spokesman for Al Qaeda has been arrested in recent days by Pakistani intelligence officers in Karachi.
Susan Atkins was the Charles Manson follower who used the knife on actress Sharon Tate on Cielo Drive in 1969. After she died this past September, Orange Coast Magazine...
Switzerland's Large Hadron Collider is also on the list, along with Norway's seed vault and the iPhone. No, it's not your typical architecture list.
Jonathan Glater, a legal affairs writer for the New York Times, has joined the UC Irvine School of Law as interim director of academic support. He's the fourth ex-journalist on staff.
There's no evidence of tornadoes forming, but the storm coming through is apparently capable of spinning them off.
Professional skateboarder Mike Vallely was involved in that post-game fracas in the stands at the Honda Center in Anaheim after a Ducks match in November.
Mark has the rundown over at LA Biz Observed on the latest Los Angeles Times restructuring to keep the place running. In closing the Orange County printing plant (and casting...
Don Shirley, a theater critic in Los Angeles for many years, including many at the L.A. Times, is now writing for L.A. Stage. He wasn't real thrilled on Sunday to...
Steve Hymon isn't the only recent media type who has taken up blogging about ice hockey. Talking Ducks: A Ladies Hockey Salon is by Orange Coast Magazine managing editor Rose...
Pang is the Newport Beach financier accused by federal regulators of a massive fraud in which millions of dollars were re-directed for his personal use. He had been taken from...
No surprise that the sordid tale of now-former OC assemblyman Michael Duvall has gone viral. Just a few minutes ago, a google search brought back thousands of hits. We've got...
The now-former OC assemblyman says on his Web site that the decision to resign was based on his "inappropriate story-telling" and should not be viewed as an admission that he...
That's the obvious takeaway after Wednesday's resignation of OC Assemblyman Michael Duvall, who inadvertently boasted of his sexual conquests over an open microphone. From the LAT: As TV camera crews...
Response to Mark Whicker's tasteless sports column in the OC Register has been so brutal that he was forced to make a public apology on the newspaper's Web site The...
According to his statement on his Web site, the OC assemblyman says "I have come to the conclusion that it would not be fair to my family, my constituents or...
In case you haven't heard (and the whole world will have heard in another few hours), Assemblyman Michael Duvall has a big mouth when it comes to his sexual trysts....
Register reporter Greg Hardesty got through to the aunt of kidnap victim Jaycee Dugard and gets a bunch of exclusive details about the family reunion after 18 years....
The parent company of the Register in Orange County is expected to become the latest newspaper company to slide into chapter 11, the Wall Street Journal reports today. Freedom Communications,...
This morning we noted a new reporter-turned-law student at UCLA. Now it's been pointed out that Frank Mickadeit, a columnist for the Register in Orange County, is also starting law...
The Times and Register have announced a deal in which L.A. Times delivery people will deliver both papers. The Register will thus become the Times' largest commercial delivery client. If...
Terranea, which opened last week on the old Marineland site in Rancho Palos Verdes, and the Resort at Pelican Hill near Newport Beach may be the last big resort compounds...
The job skills and responsibilities sought in a new county government reporter for the Register in Orange County could be a template for how out-of-work journalists should market themselves these...
The Orange County Register's communications manager is hosting a new blog to tell the rest of the story [aka the good news] about the paper and newspapers in general. Very...
The woman who claims her adoptive father was the Zodiac killer has also claimed her biological father was JFK. OC Weekly...
Irvine's new law school — the one that was, then wasn't, and now is run by Erwin Chemerinsky — got a huge number of applicants for its first class and...
In tomorrow's Daily Journal, staff writer Don DeBenedictis writes that Orange County DA Tony Rackauckas has been dismissing felony drug charges if defendants submit their DNA samples. Upset judges and...
The team released a statement on the death of pitcher Nick Adenhart, and a statement from his family. Tonight's game was cancelled at the family's request. KPCC's Steve Julian talks...
The rookie started last night, then was among three people in a Mitsubishi who died when a red-light runner hit the car in Fullerton. Adenhart, who was 22, threw six...
Over two and a half decades, Steve Plesa was the Orange County Register's features editor, cities editor and special sections editor overseeing coverage for the Food, Travel and Home &...
Add the Register in Orange County to the list of local media imposing unpaid time off on their workers. Staffers were told today to take off five days between April...
Orange County Register staffers are being asked to let Marine Corps PIO's turn the tables a bit and do ride-alongs with the journalists. Here's the newsroom memo: From: Dennis Foley/OCR/FREEDOM...
Greetings from the new home of octomom Nadya Suleman, her babies and half the TV news crews in Southern California. "It's pandemonium out here," emails longtime reader Thomas Naccarato,...
While Los Angeles readers will mostly have to just look elsewhere in the paper to find the news that used to appear in California, for those in Orange County this...
Former Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona was found guilty on one count of witness tampering and not guilty on five other charges that led to his departure from elected office....
Attorney Daniel Callahan announced that the Orange County Register has settled with his clients, 5,000 delivery carriers who filed a class-action suit five years ago over their employee status. The...
Oh no -- LAO Lite again? Not to worry, Kevin gets back tomorrow and things return to normal. Meanwhile, there's news: Of the three wildfires now burning in SoCal,...
The worst of SoCal's many fires are in Orange County (above), where more than 150 homes have burned and 1,000 more are in harm's way. OC Register Lots of first-person...
Affected staffers are being told today and Thursday that they will be laid off, The Register's publisher Terry Horne announced today. They will get the company’s standard severance package of...
Shirley Babashoff won eight medals swimming for the U.S. at the 1972 and '76 Olympics, but she and her legacy were victims of doping by her East German competition. When...
The Financial Times is reporting that Sam Zell's Tribune has been kicking the tires on the Orange County Register with an eye to "consolidate the Los Angeles newspaper market, as...
KDOC, Orange County's only commercial TV station, has dropped its morning news show "Daybreak OC." From the Orange County Business Journal report: The move comes a year after KDOC launched...
Thirty positions to be eliminated at the Register tomorrow, the OC Weekly says....
After being told that his wife was leaving him for a younger man, Los Angeles County Sheriff's deputy Robert McClain sexually tortured her and her lover for hours and left...
Of course Orange County judge David C. Velasquez was going to lose on his order barring the Register from reporting on a lawsuit against the paper by its news carriers....
Ex-LAT reporter and editor William Lobdell took some meaning from a recent perusal of the most-viewed stories at the Times and Register websites, concluding that the opinion pieces, crime briefs...
William Lobdell launched his new Orange County-centric blog with a list of the 42 things he knows after a career at the Los Angeles Times. Excerpts: 8 - The idea...
Alan Mittelstaedt, formerly an editor and L.A. Sniper columnist at CityBeat and LA Weekly (and blogging at the Weekly and at Witness LA), is joining the editing staff at the...
A New York Times style blog takes umbrage at a cover by Orange County's Coast magazine that sure borrows a lot from an earlier T Magazine cover in the NYT....
The July issue is a relaunch under Emmis ownership by new editor Martin Smith. Editor's note here. The issue's best of OC media section proclaims the Register's Frank Mickadeit as...
The toll of yesterday's newsroom cuts at the Orange County Register includes the sports editor and travel editor, a deputy editor and a design editor, among others. OC Weekly gives...
Today's slash of 80-90 employees, or 5% of the staff, is the third round of layoffs in a year at the Register's parent. Declining advertising revenue is to blame, President...
Nick Schou* thinks so and posts some intriguing evidence from a Singleton paper up north — how about a joint Media News Staff byline that includes a Register reporter's name?...
Terry Horne writes on the Orange County paper's blog that he's sorry so many readers are unhappy with recent changes in format and coverage, but "The Register is under economic...
I'm trying to keep a holiday schedule today to work on some website improvements, but there's also newspaper news from the Register in Orange County. It's killing the stand-alone Business...
N. Christian Anderson yields the publisher portion of his title to Marti Buscaglia, publisher of the Duluth News Tribune. She formerly worked at the Long Beach Press-Telegram and at La...
Executive Editor Matt Coker isn't moving north to Long Beach — he's going another 400 miles further. His email to what remains of the OC Weekly staff follows: From: Matt...
We told you yesterday afternoon that Rebecca Schoenkopf became the third exit in a week from the OC Weekly, and said her farewell "Commie Girl" column would run today. Well...
The Orange County Register has found its replacement for Mark Katches, who announced in September that he was leaving his post as Senior Team Leader/Watchdog Journalism — and leaving the...