Sure, O.C.’s ‘Perfect,’ but the World Doesn’t Want to Hear It

“The County of Orange,” a coffee-table book designed as a souvenir or promotional item, contains hundreds of photos illustrating the area’s charms, which publisher Michael A. Maxsenti of Laguna Beach touts unabashedly.

But among the glossy shots of beaches, malls, golf courses, museums, art festivals, theaters and theme parks, as well as in writer David Lansing’s paeans to the casual local lifestyle, there’s no mention of the official tourist slogan.

That would be “Orange County: The Perfect California,” for those who don’t recall the flurry of attention it attracted when the county Tourism Commission concocted it back in 1997.

Maxsenti, whose Max Co. also publishes area guides distributed in Anaheim hotel rooms, says tourism officials wanted him to use the slogan as his book’s title. But, he said, “I’m just not comfortable with it. My relatives in Northern California would laugh at me.”

He noted that calling the county “perfect” could be seen as an affront to visitors from San Diego to Sausalito and beyond. “And since the majority of the people who come here are Californians, why would we want to say something that would offend them?”

So his book, which can be previewed online at https://www.ocbook.com, contains this less debatable subtitle: “Center Of Southern California.” “We’re the heart and soul of everything people know about the region,” Maxsenti said. “With the exception of the film industry.”

E. Scott Reckard covers tourism for The Times. He can be reached at (714) 966-7407 and at scott.reckard@latimes.com.