Editor’s Pick

The first chapter from Jason Fagone‘s new book, Ingenious, about the X Prize Foundation’s $10 million competition to build a car that can travel 100 miles on a single gallon of gas. Thanks to Fagone and Crown Publishing for sharing it with the Longreads community. You can purchase the full book here.

The city of Wilmington in Ohio, a “poster child of the Great Recession,” saw its unemployment rate shoot up to 19 percent after DHL, one of its biggest employers, left. The story of how the city is bouncing back: Ironically, Wilmington’s reputation as the face of the recession ended up working in its favor. The […]

Condé Nast executives, editors, designers and writers look back on the 1983 relaunch of Vanity Fair, which originally stopped publishing in 1936 and had been folded into Vogue: As word leaked out that the company was pumping more than $10 million into the magazine, the sniping began. An enterprising Chicago Tribune reporter tracked down Clare […]

Meet the hit man who also teaches Sunday school. “Special Agent Charles Hunt” is paid by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to pose as a hit man. He’s hired by people you might, and might not, expect: There are of course lunatics who come up with painfully stupid ideas: A convicted rapist […]

Alcoholism remains a national epidemic in Russia, but a treatment program like Alcoholics Anonymous has failed to take hold in the country. Leon Neyfakh explores why: A further obstacle to AA’s growth in Russia is something more philosophical: At a basic level, its premise of sobriety through mutual support just doesn’t make sense to a […]

A profile of Mary Jo White, the chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, who is making a name for herself as a tough enforcer. But when it comes to regulating, can White keep Wall Street in check?: As the country sank into a severe recession, many wondered why the major figures in the financial […]

The tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary brought an outpouring of sympathy and money from around the world—and along with it, a new set of complications for the grieving families: The biggest fund by far was the one set up by 9 p.m. the day of the attack, under the auspices of the United Way of […]

This week’s reading list explores religious freedom and our different beliefs.

A son of Chinese immigrants learns his parents’ native tongue to learn more about who they are and where they came from: Since we last met, a lot has happened for Daniel. He is taking intermediate Mandarin — not all that close to Shanghainese, but it’s available. And he spent a summer interning in China. […]

A Longreads Guest Pick from Rebecca Hiscott, a graduate student at NYU and a features writer for Mashable: “I’m still marveling at ‘Him and Her’ by Mark Harris from the Oct. 14 issue of New York magazine. The piece is both a nuanced profile of director Spike Jonze — despite Joaquin Phoenix’s stony-faced cameo on […]