A 42,000-word, 3-continent spanning “hacker tourist” account of the laying of the (then) longest wire on earth.

After the explosion of the Columbia shuttle in 2003, two American astronauts aboard the International Space Station suddenly found themselves with no ride home.

Wikipedia entry for “Traction Park,” central New Jersey’s most dangerous mid-1980’s amusement park.

The author faces this question as she emerges from alcoholism.

An essay about the weeks after the author’s brother nearly died.

Meet Mel Bernstein. He goes by the name Dragonman, and he’s one of the largest independent purveyors of firearms in the western United States, and the self-proclaimed most armed man in America. At Dragonland—his home, shop, shooting range, and military museum outside Colorado Springs—no gun sells quicker than the weapon used in the most recent mass shooting. Amidst a new gun conversation, it’s business as usual. But even here, it turns out there’s a price to pay.

How the ex-spy tried to warn the world about Trump’s ties to Russia.

He was a college freshman partying in Manhattan for the first. He ran into a woman he knew from college, got separated from his friends, and ended up at a house party full of strangers. By the next morning, his body would be dumped in a Brooklyn driveway. Fifteen years later, the “circumstances of his death remain muddled.”

The disappearance of a once ubiquitous movie star.

Developed by early computer engineers in their spare time, improved in University comp-sci labs, and ultimately sold in coffeeshops for ten cents per game. Inside one of the most influential games ever played.

An Afghanistan love story.

When Clark Rockefeller snatched his daughter during a custody dispute, what the D.A. called “the longest con I’ve seen in my professional career” came unraveled, and the trail led to bones buried in a California backyard.

Ray Bowman and Billy Kirkpatrick, who began boosting together as teenagers, were arrested only twice during their prolific partnership. The first time was for stealing 38 records from a K-Mart in 1974. The second arrest came in 1997. In between, Bowman and Kirkpatrick robbed 27 banks, including the single biggest haul in United States history: $4,461,681 from the Seafirst Bank in suburban Tacoma.

It was burned and sunk to hide the crime. Now its probable remains have been located.

“There’s always room for another story. There’s always room for another tune.”

Facebook was supposed to open up societies like Cambodia—but instead it has wreaked havoc on the fragile political order and destroyed opposition leadership.

Forgetting a child in the backseat of a car is a horrifying mistake. But is it a crime?

“Was she supposed to play by the rules and let her talent rot inside her extraordinary body? She’s saying that for girls like her, playing nice and fair would have gotten her nowhere. If it had worked out, we would say she was the manifestation of the American dream. Now instead we just say she’s very American.”

Life as a New York Times reporter in the shadow of the war on terror.

A visit to the set of Lost Highway, minus an actual interview with the director.

A review of several books on Rupert Murdoch first criticizes the authors for not grasping the many sides of their subject, then offers a thesis of its own. He’s “not so much a man, or a cultural force, as a portrait of the modern world.”

Not education. Not income. Not even being an expert on racial disparities in health care.

“To an extent that would stun outsiders, Mr. Trump, the most talked-about human on the planet, is still delighted when he sees his name in the headlines. And he is on a perpetual quest to see it there. One former top adviser said Mr. Trump grew uncomfortable after two or three days of peace and could not handle watching the news without seeing himself on it.”

Teaching Emily Dickinson at Santa Fe Community College in Gainesville, Florida.

How a cartel invented and marketed the modern diamond.