After being diagnosed with metastatic liver cancer at age 43, Williams resolves to make the most of her “bonus time” with her young children between visits to specialists.

The weeks following a near-death experience.

On terminal inmates and those trying to save them.

On identifying the man who encouraged strangers to kill themselves over the Internet.

A step-by-step account.

On a mother’s decision to donate her daughter’s organs.

Detailing the rise and fall of the most prolific star in the history of porn, Sager’s 12,500-worder helped inspire Boogie Nights.

A self-published snapshot of the industry following the Great Recession.

The former entertainment editor at Hustler describes the psychological impact of his half-decade as a porn reviewer.

The story of an appearance by porn star Sasha Grey—referred to here as “Tasha”—on The Tyra Banks Show.

An essay on what Internet porn has done to American sexuality.

As the war begins to end, Iraqis confront a broken country.

As U.S. troops departed, Baghdad in ruins.

Inside the safe houses where Syrian youth protesters have retreated since the uprising.

An account of captivity.

An interview with Shadid.

On his enduring relevance.

A scholarly look at the 2004 hit.

A transcript of an interview timed to the release of Jay-Z’s book, Decoded.

An early profile.

David Johnson’s unrequited correspondence with Jay-Z.

On the psychological considerations behind breast augmentation.

During World War I, surgeon Harold Gillies and sculptor Anna Coleman Ladd created masks for disfigured soldiers. Gillies’ work, especially, served as the basis for modern surgical techniques.

A profile of the controversial “Dr. Schnoz,” author of My Beautiful Mommy, a children’s book about plastic surgery, and the doctor behind “Operation Chuppah,” which gave Orthodox Jewish women free nose jobs to attract husbands.

After learning that his twin girls will be born with cleft palates, Chernoff and his wife begin the long process of preparing for corrective surgery.

Plastic surgery on the parts most people don’t see.

On the shared life of Tatiana and Krista Hogan, four years old and joined at the head.

A comprehensive history of the case against the Menendez brothers.

In the late 60s and early 70s, Austin Wiggins forced his three teenage daughters to play their strange music at New Hampshire ballrooms, firm in the belief that they would become stars. They did not.

On the perspective-bending art of identical twins Trevor and Ryan Oakes.

How three brothers from Chicago found tremendous success in their respective fields—Rahm in politics, Ari in Hollywood and Zeke in medicine—by their mid-30s.

Three years after skipping town, Bulger was frustrating investigators and endearing himself to neighbors all over the country. He made a particularly good impression with Gautreaux family in Grand Isle, Louisiana, where he spent the winter in 1995 and 1996 with the girlfriend who led to his eventual capture in 2011.

A view of the Barefoot Bandit from his hometown.

Can a writer disappear in America for a month with a $5,000 bounty on his head? Ratliff tried to find out, and found himself with an unnerving amount of free time.

The story of how Benjamin Holmes, wanted by the FBI for arson, spent two decades hiding in plain sight. (Also the story of how, when Holmes finally came back to see his wife, she shot him.)

On the run in Canada with Randy Quaid and his wife Evi as the try to evade “the Hollywood Star Whackers.”

A visit to the French hideaway of Ira Einhorn, co-founder of Earth Day, who had avoided arrest on murder charges for nearly 20 years. Einhorn was extradited to the United States in 2001 and is now serving a life sentence.

He’s the first kid to be featured on the side of a milk carton—and his father thinks he knows who abducted him from a New York City street in 1979.

From “comely heiress” to “armed terrorist,” an overview of the Patty Hearst kidnapping published weeks after her debut as a bank robber.

Meet Rick Strawn, the man who’ll abduct your problem child for a fee.

Rohde was kidnapped while reporting in Afghanistan. His story—in five parts—in his own words.

Elizabeth Smart, age 14, was kidnapped from her bedroom in a Salt Lake City suburb. She was found nine months later with an itinerant preacher and his wife. Theories on why it took so long.

Several American men working in the oil industry are kidnapped on the job in Ecuador.

Did Bruno Hauptmann really kidnap the Lindbergh baby? An overview of the case amidst a bunch of arguing scholars.

In 1916, a down-on-its-luck traveling circus hung its star elephant. The crime? Murder.

The similarities between the reactions of elephants and humans to childhood trauma.

On imperialism, doubt and a day in colonial Burma.

Is it ever OK for zoos to display elephants? And if not, what should keepers do with them?

Nearly everything you could want to know about elephants, plus the metaphysical questions the animals raise about our own consciousness.

Riding rescued elephants through a wildlife park.

The complicated post-baseball days of Joe DiMaggio.

Basketball’s iconoclast is now a broke recluse at 37.

Five years after they leave the league, 60 percent of NBA players have nothing left. In the NFL, it’s closer to 80 percent after just two years. A breakdown of the economics of retirement.

Terrell Owens at 38: unemployed, nearly bankrupt after losing his shirt in a electronic-bingo entertainment complex development plan gone bust, father of four children (one of which he has never met), frequent bowler.

Before he was a Twitter savant, Jose Canseco was a juiced-up terror.

Former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling needed funding for his ambitious video-game startup. Rhode Island politicians needed jobs and a vision for how to transform the state’s beleaguered economy. The story of a $75 million bet gone bust.

The crumbling of an American icon.

On Stephon Marbury’s (not totally sad!) NBA exile in China.

Baseball legend Lenny Dykstra’s on-field brilliance and private-life disasters, from drunk driving to failed investment and publishing ventures.

A profile of Jordan at 50.