Lia Matera

@liamatera

Author liamatera.com 12 crime novels, 2 Edgar nominations; 14 stories, 1 Shamus winner, 1 Int'l Thriller Award nom Editor, anthology of stories by my betters ChatGPT says I died in 2022, making me...a ghost writer? Member CA Bar Sorry, I don't reply to DMs

1,956 Following1,810 Followers1,358 Posts

YouTube Bluesky

Is this your profile?Claim it and liamatera.dirty.social is yours.Claim profile

Lia Matera@liamatera· 19d

"What if we call it Operation This Time Will Be Different?" New Yorker cartoon, Brendan Loper.

Two generals at a conference table in front of a world map. One says to the other, "What if we call it Operation This Time Will Be Different?"

Lia Matera@liamatera· 19d

Raymond Chandler was born on this day 138 years ago. He didn't begin writing till he was 44, but he left behind 27 years of brilliant prose.

"He snorted and hit me in the solar plexus.
I bent over and took hold of the room with both hands and spun it. When I had it nicely spinning I gave it a full swing and hit myself on the back of the head with the floor."
From Pearls are a Nuisance
"From 30 feet away she looked like a lot of class. From 10 feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from 30 feet away."
From The High Window
"It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window."
From Farewell, My Lovely
"She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket."
Farewell, My Lovely

"The girl gave him a look which ought to have stuck at least four inches out of his back."
The Long Goodbye
"I'm an occasional drinker, the kind of guy who goes out for a beer and wakes up in Singapore with a full beard."
Philip Marlowe's Guide to Life
"She smelled the way the Taj Mahal looks by moonlight."
The Little Sister
"He was a guy who talked with commas, like a heavy novel."
The Long Goodbye
"She had eyes like strange sins."
The High Window

Lia Matera@liamatera· 21d

Marco Rubio has distributed an official State Department list— literally praising McCarthy-era blacklists—of supposed Cuban-influenced agents of “pro-terrorist activism.” Trying to chill criticism of planned Cuba invasion by threatening arrests for terrorism? www.kenklippenstein.com/p/after-poli...

List of names & organizations from A to C includes Karen Bass, mayor of Los Angeles, and Ben Cohen of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream

List from D to N includes Mayor Mamdani of NYC and Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now

List P to W includes Congress members Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Presley, Maxine Waters

Lia Matera@liamatera· 23d

My author photo in the ‘90s. 90s hair 😏

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jul 3

From the account of a professor at Columbia (not sure on which platform -- I saw the screenshot on FB):

Explainer that says large corporations own 87% of rent-stabilized apartments in NYC; and that mega corps like Blackstone Group -- whose CEO makes more than $1billion/year and which owns 56% of the market -- is pushing a myth that rent stabilization hurts "mom and pop" landlords, but those make up only 1.2% of rent stabilized apartments.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jul 3

Happy DOB, Franz Kafka, July 3, 1883. I do too much doomscrolling lately to take his advice to seek out "books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves" But I'm glad to have read so many like that & I will again in cheerier times.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jul 1

It’s bizarre & outrageous that Kavenaugh told Trump exactly how to flip his SCOTUS vote for a possibly different outcome if Trump can get birthright citizenship before SCOTUS based on GOP in congress changing 8 USC sec 1401(a) by simple majority in each house. Trump’s already pushing GOP to do it.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 26

The Editorial Board headline is fake but it's definitely in the spirit of Bezos' Washington Post.

Fake Washington Post headline dated December 1941, over a photo from the movie Casablanca, of Victor Laszlo leading patrons in "La Marseillaise" to drown out occupying soldiers in Rick's Café singing a German anthem. The headline reads "Let the Germans sing in peace."

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 26

Not only is Norway stunningly beautiful… when I visited Bergen, Norwegians — seemingly *very* happy to be there — filled my hotel room with the sound of hours of group singing (sound on to hear a bit of it).

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 21

I’ve had this license plate holder on my car for many years (numbers scrambled in photo) but no one’s ever commented on it.

License plate holder reads “Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra”

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 18

Beautiful photo! It looks like a book cover. Cute little bunnies, smaller than cats, live in the ivy patch near my patio. I'm lucky to see them a few times a month but never manage to get a good picture through not-so-clean windows.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 14

Happy President Barack Obama Appreciation Day!

Photo of Barack Obama on a postcard in the Nobel Prize Museum in Stockholm, Sweden.

Back of postcard of Barack Obama in Nobel Prize Museum reads “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples”

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 9

From Jay Kuo on FB, why it takes so long to tally CA votes, why early reporting is a "red mirage" changing as mail-in ballots are counted. Especially true this year, I found, as many Dems waited till last days to decide who to support for governor. To read full post: www.facebook.com/nycjayjay/po...

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 5

We lost so much. That day led to Vietnam War prolonged; Reagan closing mental health facilities, creating widespread homelessness & AIDS epidemic; W's stupid war & embrace of torture; abortion criminalized; voting rights gutted; democracy threatened by Trump's greed, racism & muzzling gutless media.

NYT, June 5, 1968, headline: Kennedy Shot and Gravely Wounded After Winning California Primary...

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 4

Cartoon of couple in bed, woman awakened and saying to man, about a small robot waiting in the doorway, “It’s AI again. He wants another thousand glasses of water.”

Lia Matera@liamatera· Jun 1

Matera, Italy I don’t know when/how my family took the surname, never heard relatives mention Matera despite living 150 miles from it. I loved getting there last month, seeing ancient cave dwellings, still in use, carved into stone hills. (And yes, fun to be in a town where my name is everywhere. 😀)

Lia Matera@liamatera· May 7

I loved Platform Decay, Martha Wells' new Murderbot novel. I love a satisfying ending. I don't always need a happy ending, but I hate feeling bushwhacked by poorly set up unhappy endings. I want to be left nodding & thoughtful, if not smiling & pleased. This & every other Murderbot book does both. ❤️

Cover of the audiobook of Martha Wells' Platform Decay

Lia Matera@liamatera· May 4

From 5 years ago, but "A Certain Type of Columnist" is still writing these articles.

Lia Matera@liamatera· May 1

Rabbit rabbit! "Precarious of the World Let's Conspire"

A poster shows a full-color cartoon of a toddler/young child handing a chicken (?) to a rabbit in an apron, against a background ringed with names of European capital cities. The caption above reads "Euro First of May/Mayday/005" and under the art, "Precarious of the World/Let's conspire!"

Lia Matera@liamatera· Apr 30

New Yorker cartoon, published OTD in 2018, is as fresh as ever.

A man in medieval garb reads a scroll aloud as a monarch enters a town square: "All hail the king, emperor of the earth, ruler of the air and seas, arbiter of what is funny."

Lia Matera@liamatera· Apr 29

I'm loving the audiobook of Tana French's new novel, narrated with Irish accents I'd never approximate in my head reading text. It's #3 in a series about a retired Chicago cop in very rural Ireland. It's a slow steady pleasure of characters, setting, turns of phrase, with a building sense of dread.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Apr 29

Good thing for MAGA that IOKIYAR is Kash Patel's guiding principle, or he might have to find out who "threatened" Joe Biden by buying and wearing these hats.

Three hats available on amazon that have 8646 appliqued on them.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Apr 13

I screen-grabbed this tweet from several years ago because it said it so well.

Old JesseLaGreca tweet reads, 'I swear to fucking GOD this "I won't vote for the lesser of 2 evils shit is like the best thing that ever happened to the greater evil'

Lia Matera@liamatera· Apr 13

Toles' cartoon from 2017 is even more true today.

Trump, holding a cannon labelled "Trump Foreign Policy," has created a big hole in an Oval Office wall. Beside him, a man in a suit says, "Now what?" and Trump replies, "Now draw a target around it."

Lia Matera@liamatera· Apr 9

Trump's early evening Truth Social post. It reads like transcribed tape recorder evidence in a sanity hearing.

Lia Matera@liamatera· Mar 26

A few years ago, goofing off with ChatGPT, I asked it to write my author bio. It popped up in my FB memories today. A few things it got wrong: my birth date & age, where I went to college, how many books I wrote, the MC of 2 of the books. It also gave me an award I didn't win & TOLD ME I WAS DEAD 👻

Lia Matera@liamatera· Mar 26

Danziger cartoon from March 19, 2017 "President Does His Bracket"
Every entry on the basketball-type bracket says "Me" with winner "Me!"

Lia Matera@liamatera· Mar 25

March 25th is Tolkien Reading Day "It does not do to leave a leave dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." "Such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere." Thèoden to ̶T̶r̶u̶m̶p̶ Saruman:

Lia Matera@liamatera· Mar 24

Cartoon from July 20, 2018 by Tim Snyder:

Special Counsel Robert Mueller attempting to complete a puzzle which is very obviously of Donald Trump, with some pieces missing.
A guy in a "MAGA" hat & shirt reading "BUT HILLARY'S EMAILS" says to him, "Nice try Mueller, but lots of missing pieces there. It could be anybody."

Lia Matera@liamatera· Mar 22

San Francisco airport is one of 20 that hires private screeners with exact same training as TSA. Their salaries are pre-funded through hiring contracts, unaffected by govt shutdowns. I hope Trump hates that SFO isn’t part of the mess he made. A list of all 20, if you want to avoid ICE when you fly: