Longform

The story of Nicole Davis, a 25-year-old woman diagnosed with breast cancer six months into her pregnancy.

A painter’s dogged, doomed pursuit of the perfect $100 bill.

The search for a missing ultramarathoner in New Mexico’s Gila Wilderness, and the life that lead him there.

Portraits from weed country.

A summer as a whorehouse Madame.

A profile of singer-songwriter Will Oldham.

He has settled into character as an uncanny troubadour, singing a sort of transfigured country music, and he has become, in his own subterranean way, a canonical figure. Johnny Cash covered him, Björk has championed him (she invited him to appear on the soundtrack of “Drawing Restraint 9”), and Madonna, he suspects, has quoted him (her song “Let It Will Be” seems to borrow from his “O Let It Be,” though he says, “I’m fully prepared to accept that it’s a coincidence”).

An essay on the “history, meaning and practice of suicide, from third-century Christian death cults to the Aurora Bridge.”

The author reflects on his mayoral run with Norman Mailer against John Lindsay.

At the bar one night a couple of weeks after the primary, I looked up from a drink and saw my face and Norman's face floating across the screen on the NBC First Tuesday show. It is a network thing, and they did a 20-minute look at our campaign. The show reinforced my opinion that Norman and I had some of the most terrific lows in the history of anything that ever took place in this city. And, perhaps, a couple of highs that could be recognized as time passes a bit. Like maybe colleges for years will be using the things Norman Mailer was saying out in the streets.

A profile of former Bosnia Serb military commander Ratko Mladic, whose war crimes trial began, and was abruptly suspended, this week.

A posthumous profile of Whitney Houston.

How Chief Justice John Roberts pulled off Citizens United.

On the perils and poisons of mining for gold in southeastern Peru.

“I didn’t realize who my father was. So it didn’t make a whole lot of difference. I wasn’t there believing that I was receiving genius from on high. My father was my father.”

For a half-century fires have burned under Centralia, PA.

In a speech that’s getting a bit of flak for recycling some of his past lines, the stage- and screenwriter says it’s okay to make mistakes along the way:

And make no mistake about it, you are dumb. You're a group of incredibly well-educated dumb people. I was there. We all were there. You're barely functional. There are some screw-ups headed your way. I wish I could tell you that there was a trick to avoiding the screw-ups, but the screw-ups, they're a-coming for ya. It's a combination of life being unpredictable, and you being super dumb.

On the final two holdouts in Treece, Kansas, a former mining town that is soon to be wiped off the maps.

“Being Justin Bieber means having an endless number of T-shirts to destroy.” A profile of the pop star just after his 18th birthday.

The autopsy of a once-dominant site.

A Kenyan runner loses himself in Alaska.

How one company is rethinking the business of sex toys.

A profile of Jamie Dimon as he became CEO of JP Morgan Chase.

Remembering Patrice O’Neal.

How a convicted sexual predator emptied the bank accounts and ruined the lives of several women from behind bars.

The story of Southern Flight 242.