'¡Asking For Honesty!' About LA Times Book Review

Gustavo Arellano got a book review in the Los Angeles Times that every writer dreams of. With glowing prose they dubbed his book ¡Ask a Mexican! as "hilarious and testy," "insightful," and "witty and fearless." "Arellano ... offer[s] much-needed common sense," added the Times. A nice color photo of Arellano accompanies the review. (See an image of the article here.) Sounds great, doesn't it?

So ... What's the problem? Nowhere in the review does the paper bother to disclose that Arellano is a contributing editor to the Times. For the paper he has penned no less than ten columns in the last 11 months, including a book review that was published only a couple of weeks ago.

In other words, Arellano had about as much chance of receiving a negative review as it snowing in Santa Monica this week.

Honesty and integrity at the Los Angeles Times? Not in this case, folks.