How Reporting Creates Change: A Conversation with Pamela Colloff
Writing is always going to be hard. Here’s why the struggle is worth it.
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Longreads features
Vinyl in the Veins
Behind the nostalgia lies an uncomfortable truth: Every record is made of oil.
My Almond Archive
In southeastern Italy, almond groves hold centuries of local history. A granddaughter returns to gather the bitter and the sweet.
Curiosity as Compassion: A Conversation with Susan Orlean
Why it’s important to cultivate resilience and curiosity as a writer.
The Cousin Returns
On coming home to the Philippines.
‘It’s More Like a Playlist’: Lavinia Spalding on Editing the Best Women’s Travel Writing
The editor of The Best Women’s Travel Writing series on curation, grief and levity, and the stories she hopes to read more of in the future.
Living in an Alive World
Soft eyes, deep listening, and other ways to extend human perception beyond our limits.
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Weekly Top 5
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Standout pieces from Masha Hamilton, Brian Underwood, Libby Callaway, Ben Markovits, and Devon Pendleton.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Showcasing stories from William Finnegan, Meghan Flaherty, Kulsoom Ijaz, Amy Weiss-Meyer, and Dan Werb.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Recommending stories from Hua Hsu, Amanda Petrusich, Michelle Cyca, Emily Nemens, and Helen Lewis.
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Learn to Love Your Search Results Again.
Introducing the Longreads Story Recommender.
The Longreads questionnaire
The Longreads Questionnaire, Featuring s.e. smith
The All My Dead Cats and Other Losses author and Flytrap co-founder on grief, breaking and fixing things, and Alice Wong.
The Longreads Questionnaire, Featuring Aymann Ismail
The Slate writer and Becoming Baba author reflects on Newark and mosques as home, making sense of Egypt on long flights, and becoming a father.
The Longreads Questionnaire, Featuring Elisa Gabbert
The author of Any Person Is the Only Self and recent Guggenheim fellow talks about the worst time of day, the value of wasting an hour, and chilaquiles.
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Excerpts from The Atavist Magazine, our sister publication
God’s Children
The Kerrs were devoted to one another and to their faith. But when one of their own rejected modern medicine, they faced a dire question: What if her children ever needed a doctor to save their lives?
The Fugitive Childhood of a Cocaine Smuggler’s Daughters
“When their parents ripped two young sisters from their privileged lives, gave them fake names, and took them on the lam, they thought it was because their father was in trouble with the IRS. It would be years before they learned the truth about his life of crime.”
‘Nothing Together’
My brother’s murder and its aftermath.
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Longreads reading lists
Constructions, Concoctions, Conjurations: A Reading List on the Curious World of Conlangs
Making stuff up is harder, stranger, and occasionally more dangerous than it looks. Seven stories that explore the world of constructed languages.
Daylight Savings Time: A (Beach) Reading List for the Lighthearted
It’s summer, people. Let’s enjoy a little bit of levity.
Brave New World: A Reading List About the Dark Future
Five stories that make Aldous Huxley’s 1932 novel feel like nonfiction.
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