“Though the embryo was only seven weeks old, I loved it. I loved it and wanted it, and its life ended.”
Essays & Criticism
The Disease of Deceit
Friends don’t let friends lie about having cancer.
Whatever Happened to ______ ?
Envy over her success led her husband, also a writer, to become violent. She fights every day for her safety — and to avoid being relegated to obscurity like so many writers who are mothers.
Happily Never After
By protecting ourselves and no one else, we destroy ourselves along with everyone else.
Searching Sephora for an Antidote to Aging — and Grief
Five years after her mother’s death, while still grieving and suddenly middle-aged, Abby Mims turns to beauty products to cure what ails her.
The God Phone
What happens when ordinary people play God to strangers? Leora Smith explores the history of one of the oldest art installations at Burning Man and the conversations that unfold there.
The Price of Dominionist Theology
After leaving fundamentalism, Eve Ettinger grapples with the loaded theological heritage of evangelical personal finance teachings.
What Brings True Happiness: the Booze or the Bonding?
“But there’s nothing wrong with a nudge toward examining the difference between what makes us happy and what is merely habitual.”
Elizabeth Wurtzel Made it Okay to Write ‘Ouch’
Today’s memoirists and personal essay writers owe a debt of gratitude to the Prozac Nation author for rewriting an inhibiting rule.
What I Did for (Strange) Love
As a teen, Laura Bond went all out to meet Depeche Mode — and to hang onto her best friend.
