How a night of drunken mischief led to the death of a rare endangered fish and a rare prosecution.

A profile of Erik Prince, then the CEO of America’s largest and most controversial mercenary force, Blackwater, who happened to be a C.I.A. agent.

After decades of mismanaging its nuclear waste, the US Department of Energy wrestles with its toxic legacy.

On a basketball coach starting over at the lowest levels of the game after his ascendant NCAA career ended in a hazy tabloid scene at a Cleveland crackhouse.

The story of Max Factor, a Polish immigrant who revoltuionized Hollywood cosmetics starting in the 1920s, and his “Beauty Calibrator” machine.

The profile of a 34-year-old woman named Charity Johnson who tricked people all over the country into believing she was still in high school.

In the 1970s, Chile was on the verge of developing sophisticated technology to monitor its economy. Then America intervened.

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.”

On the lesbian separatists of the 1970s, who “created a shadow society devoted to living in an alternate, penisless reality.”

On Finland, the country most afraid of Russia.

The life of the former defensive tackle, who was paralyzed during a kickoff return.

A profile of Killer Mike, the self-described “gangsta rap suburban father” whose speech about Ferguson went viral last fall.

The complicated case of Michelle Kosilek, a murderer fighting for sexual reassignment surgery.

The rocky career and enduring appeal of country legend Charlie Rich, “the missing link between Elvis Presley and Ray Charles.”

The rise of an expensive, experimental stem-cell treatment in China and the medical tourism it attracts.

The disappearance of a legendary scavenger could have dire consequences for a swelling human population.

Alarmingly sophisticated imitations of American currency have turned up all over the world and the false-paper trail leads to North Korea.

A Houston man allegedly tries to hire several hit men to kill his wife. Each fails miserably. It becomes the talk of the town.

On the surprising radicalism of library music – “music that has been composed and recorded for commercial purposes.”

“Calça de veludo ou bunda de fora.” Why Neymar, one of the world’s best talents hasn’t taken the money and run.

The story of Brownie Wise, the woman who made Tupperware a household name.

An interview with Clay Shirky on “why no medium has ever survived the indifference of 25-year-olds.”

An excerpt from a new biography explores the trio of tragedies that struck Dahl’s family just as his career was taking off.

Anxiety, weight, general well-being—how the first nine months determine the rest of your life.

Sex in the NBA in the wake of Magic Johnson’s HIV announcement.