Of Breakdowns and Breakthroughs

In this personal essay, after suicides and heartbreak ravage her family, Jenny Aurthur finds she has no choice but be transformed.

Source: Longreads
Published: May 4, 2018
Length: 27 minutes (6,886 words)

No Journalist Should Have to Know How to Survive in Prison

After a recent trip to Myanmar, Alice Driver considers the ever-present dangers for journalists there and in Mexico, where she lives.

Source: Longreads
Published: May 3, 2018
Length: 10 minutes (2,616 words)

A Kickback Grows in Brooklyn

Brooklyn’s historically Black neighborhoods Crown Heights and Bed-Stuy are now some of America’s most gentrified zip codes. Three new Black-owned bars are protecting space for Black residents and culture: Sisters, Ode to Babel, and Bed Vyne Brew.

Author: Muna Mire
Source: Eater
Published: Apr 18, 2018
Length: 7 minutes (1,987 words)

Talent Isn’t Enough When You’re a Fat Ballerina

“What does it mean when your body is your art? Can a thicker brush not make just as beautiful strokes?”

Source: Catapult
Published: May 3, 2018
Length: 9 minutes (2,450 words)

The Baby-Formula Crime Ring

It’s pricey, it’s portable, its users need it constantly, and retailers love to buy it at a discount. All of which makes it a perfect product to steal.

Published: May 2, 2018
Length: 25 minutes (6,466 words)

It’s Like This and Like That and Like What?

When the nineties’ heart of whiteness met g-funk, it was the illest — and wackest — of times.

Source: Longreads
Published: May 2, 2018
Length: 11 minutes (2,912 words)

Forgetting the Madeleine

A pastry chef reflects on taste, memory, and literature’s most famous confection.

Source: Longreads
Published: May 3, 2018
Length: 13 minutes (3,315 words)

Becoming Spring Brucesteen: My Quest to Meet the Boss

It took Toniann Fernandez a decade after first leaving her New Jersey home to understand the appeal of Bruce Springsteen, the state’s officially sanctioned saint, and she tracks her various exploits this past year in what eventually becomes a futile attempt to meet the Boss.

Published: Apr 25, 2018
Length: 16 minutes (4,122 words)

Birds of a Feather

On the not-so-surprisingly tight bonds between parrot enthusiasts and their feathered friends.

Source: Topic
Published: May 1, 2018
Length: 8 minutes (2,054 words)

Over 400 Startups Are Trying to Become the Next Warby Parker. Inside the Wild Race to Overthrow Every Consumer Category

Venture capitalists are funding DTC, or direct to consumer, startups that apply the Warby Parker model to everything from tampons to potted plants. The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School has become an incubator. Tootbrush subscriptions sound cool, but can DTCs remake certain products that don’t need makeovers?

Author: Tom Foster
Source: Inc.
Published: Apr 19, 2018
Length: 17 minutes (4,281 words)