A Scary Abundance of Water
Growing up with the San Fernando Valley.
David McCullough: The Art of Biography No. 2
An interview on craft.
Seven Days on the Queen Mary 2
“‘If there’s anything I can do to make your trip more enjoyable, let me know.” He walked away, then he strode back to Cree 15 seconds later and whispered, making eye contact, “Anything.’”
The Wonderful and Weird World of Thuzio
Investigating a former NFL star’s new business: renting professional athletes to their biggest fans.
Gratuitous Pictures of Your Grief
On the late singer Judee Sill, the virtual cemetery site Find a Grave, and memorials in the age of the Twitter RIP.
The Final Battles of Pope Benedict XVI
“Fear is running rampant in the Curia, where the mood has rarely been this miserable. It’s as if someone had poked a stick into a beehive. Men wearing purple robes are rushing around, hectically monitoring correspondence. No one trusts anyone anymore, and some even hesitate to communicate by phone.”
Sunk: The Incredible Truth About a Ship That Never Should Have Sailed
How the Bounty, a busted-up replica built in 1960 for the film Mutiny on the Bounty, ended up 100 miles out to sea during the height of Hurricane Sandy.
The Shooter
A profile of the Navy Seal who killed Osama bin Laden and came home to a life in shambles.
A Leg Rebuilt, a Life Renewed
A profile of former Duke basketball star Jay Williams a decade after the motorcycle crash that ended his career.
Original Sin
How Republicans came to be the party of white people.
Match-Fixing in Soccer
How Singaporean mobster Tan Seet Eng, aka Dan Tan, and a global network of fixers influenced as many 680 soccer matches at the highest levels.
Down in the Sago Mine
The story of twelve men trapped in a West Virginia mine, as remembered by the lone survivor.
Amazon Unpacked
Thousands of new warehouse jobs were supposed to help lift a struggling British economy. Instead, employees started equating the work with “being in a slave camp.”
Up From Downey
A profile of Richard and Karen Carpenter.
Kidnapping Grandma Braun
An 88-year-old woman is taken from her Wisconsin farmhouse. Inside the investigation to find her.
Frank Ocean Can Fly
A profile of Lonny Breaux, post-fame.
What Makes Larry Run?
Larry Brown’s mystifying, unpredictable career.
Sponsored
Sponsor: Aeon Magazine
Our sponsor again this week is Aeon, a great new digital magazine covering ideas and culture. Aeon publishes an original essay every weekday, several of which have been picked for Longform. Here are three recent favorites:
No Drama, King Obama, by Edward L. Fox
In Javanese culture, a ruler must stand chivalrously above strife: cool, intelligent and self-contained. Sound familiar?
Mortal Remains, by Thomas Lynch
The dead are no longer welcome at their own funerals. So how can the living send them on their way?
Animal Spirits, by Stephen T. Asma
The more we learn about the emotions shared by all mammals, the more we must rethink our own human intelligence.
Read those stories and more at aeonmagazine.com.
The Old Man at Burning Man
A father-son trip to the Playa.
We Never Have to Be Alone
Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show’s thrilling, scary, inept performance on German television.
Joshua Topolsky is editor-in-chief of The Verge.
"Sometimes you tell stories that people don't know they need to read yet. You have to keep telling those kinds of stories, and eventually people will wake up to them. Of course we look at traffic. But the main thing is, are we doing good work? At the end of the week or the end of the day, do I think, that was awesome, I'm really glad we wrote that?"
Thanks to TinyLetter for sponsoring this week's episode!
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The Perfect Forecast
On meterologic obsession, making weather, and very powerful storms.
My Brother's Keeper
Throughout their troubled lives, identical twins William and Chris Cormier shared a preternatural bond. Then the body of a Florida journalist ended up in their backyard.
Sick
Visiting a lost friend.
The Panasonic Toughpad Press Conference
“I am not a tech journalist. I have never done this before. I don’t know what’s going on. Like most journalists everywhere, I am hungover.”
