Grammy-winning liner notes describing the rise, fall, and rebirth of Roky Erickson, who founded the psychedelic rock pioneers The Thirteenth Floor Elevators before a charge stemming from a single marijuana joint landed him in a Texas mental hospital.

The crimes of former NFL star Rae Carruth.

Previously: “The Boy They Couldn’t Kill” (Thomas Lake • Sports Illustrated)

A cross-country drive with Michael O'Donoghue, the first head writer of Saturday Night Live.

Previously: The Longform Guide to SNL.

Inside the split of the Hoefler/Frere-Jones typography team.

“I did a few days on Franco’s As I Lay Dying, and the vibe on the set was very heavy and serious. The only thing I can equate it to is tripping with a bunch of your friends.”

Memories of life as a freshman cheerleader.

“Be careful. The toe you stepped on yesterday may be connected to the ass you have to kiss today.”

A profile of the late Buddy Cianci, who was twice forced to resign as mayor of Providence after being convicted of felonies.

Text from the books and Foster Wallace’s corresponding annotations:

Along with all the Wittgenstein, Husserl and Borges, he read John Bradshaw, Willard Beecher, Neil Fiore, Andrew Weil, M. Scott Peck and Alice Miller. Carefully.

An insider history of the fall of Myspace; from Rupert Murdoch calling Facebook a mere “communications utility” to the disastrous 2006 deal with Google that demanded huge pageviews and ads everywhere, and finally the present day ruins of a titan.

Notes from the campaign trail in Nevada with Ron Paul.

Part of Longform.org’s guide to the 2012 GOP field at Slate.

When Putin suggested to Obama that the White House and the Kremlin speak through an intermediary, he named who he thought was the obvious candidate: his friend Steven Seagal.

Carl Malamud is on a quest to change the way average citizens can interface with the government – by scanning its paperwork and making it available free online. And he’s financing his effort with his own credit cards.

In July 2008, the director of a Denver non-profit received a package containing house keys, a will, a $100,000 check and what appeared to be a suicide note. She didn’t go to the bank–or to the cops.

War stories from the world of Manhattan real estate, written during an era when everybody knew the Internet would completely change the business and nobody quite knew how.

Born into Sea Org; a diary of a misspent youth (and adulthood) in the service of Scientology. “One of the first things I learned in the Sea Org, because I was a receptionist, was how to handle process servers.” (25,000 words)

A profile of Rev. William Barber II, who gave one of the most memorable speeches at last summer’s Democratic National Convention and is now leading the Christian protest against the White House.

The members of Girls Travel Baseball come from all over the country, compete against boys, and aim to prove they can play in the major leagues.

Over eight years, through millions of letters, the staff of the White House mailroom read the unfiltered story of a nation.

At 18, Katie Stubblefield lost her face. At 21, she became the youngest person in the U.S. to undergo the still experimental procedure to get a new one.

The President received at least $413 million in today’s dollars from his father’s real estate empire, much of it through tax dodges in the 1990s.

A car crash in Kentucky left a 13-year-old girl dead. A Sudanese refugee was charged with her killing. The story of the trial that followed.

The story of a young man from rural Ghana who bought a pair of secret camera glasses and got himself smuggled across the Sahara, to film crime and exploitation along the way.

“After receiving a trove of documents from the whistleblower, I found myself under surveillance and investigation by the U.S. government.”

The writer’s family saw an unmarked NYPD cruiser hit a Black teenager. He tried to find out how it happened, and instead found all of the ways the NYPD is shielded from accountability.

On the Capitol assault.

Some people may treat the appearance of a Confederate flag as another bit of absurdity, but I’ve never had the luxury of taking it in any way other than literally and seriously.