Congratulations, You’re a Congresswoman. Now What?

Ayanna Pressley and Abigail Spanberger were part of a wave of Democrats who took office this year full of hope. Maintaining it has not been easy.

Published: Nov 18, 2019
Length: 57 minutes (14,400 words)

The Wild Story of the NBA’s Most Unlikely Heist

How executive Jeff David stole $13 million from the Sacramento Kings.

Source: ESPN
Published: Nov 19, 2019
Length: 25 minutes (6,400 words)

The Most Remote Emergency Room

Life and death in rural America in the age of telemedicine.

Author: Eli Saslow
Published: Nov 16, 2019
Length: 14 minutes (3,500 words)

Gritty’s Reign Has Just Begun

Mascots are safe to love in an era when nothing is. Gritty and Phang, Philly’s newest mascots, exemplify why.

Author: Eve Peyser
Source: Vice Magazine
Published: Nov 18, 2019
Length: 8 minutes (2,100 words)

A 17-Mile Hike to Unite San Francisco

A motley alliance decided that a single trail could bring together this divided city. A sixth-generation native sets out to walk it.

Published: Nov 18, 2019
Length: 9 minutes (2,400 words)

The Designers and the Don

How two interior decorators took the fall for the Cali Cartel.

Source: USA Today
Published: Nov 18, 2019
Length: 61 minutes (15,400 words)

The Trial of Chuck Berry

At the peak of his fame, one of the architects of rock ‘n’ roll was arrested under the Mann Act for illegaly transporting a minor across state lines. But to the 14 year old girl named Janice Escalante who claimed Berry raped her 14 times, the law’s language around his behavior is tragically unjust, because it has shaped Berry’s historical narrative, mentioning illegal transporation instead of “child sexual abuse” or “rape.”

Source: Medium
Published: Nov 12, 2019
Length: 38 minutes (9,729 words)

Trigger

Willie Nelson’s been playing the same guitar — a Martin N-20 classical — for 50 years. In this fantastic profile from 2013, Michael Hall chronicles not only the life and times of Willie and his trusted sidekick, Trigger, but the laborious care and tending of an instrument that is the primary tool of a living musical legend.

Source: Texas Monthly
Published: Jan 21, 2013
Length: 25 minutes (6,257 words)

Party Girl

An essay in which Longreads contributor Monica Drake recounts learning that a young, white, male intern at a literary magazine she’d submitted to had publicly humiliated her by taking her story to a party to read aloud and mock a sex scene she had included — a scene in which gender dynamics are upended.

Source: Gay Magazine
Published: Nov 13, 2019
Length: 8 minutes (2,019 words)

The Creator of the Shitty Media Men List Isn’t Done

Nona Willis Aronowitz profiles Moira Donegan, an emerging feminist author who once worried she’d be defined — and ruined  — by the google spreadsheet she created as a safe space for women in media to anonymously share their experiences of sexual harassment and discrimination.

Source: Vice Magazine
Published: Nov 18, 2019
Length: 12 minutes (3,212 words)