The Unfinished Story of Emmett Till’s Final Journey
“Till was murdered 65 years ago. Sites of commemoration across the Mississippi Delta still struggle with what’s history and what’s hearsay.”
The End of Girlboss Is Here
“The girlboss didn’t change the system; she thrived within it. Now that system is cracking, and so is this icon of millennial hustle.”
The Evidence Against Her
He raped and tortured her for years. He had a gun; he “showed her diagrams of the human brain… the place that would allow her to live but without speech or memory. ‘Wouldn’t that be convenient, he said.'” She shot him, to save herself and her kids. And according to the prosecutor, jury, and judge, she’s a premeditated murderer who deserves her 20-year prison sentence.
The Harsh Future of American Cities
How Covid-19 could stop the move toward density and bustling urban centers.
An Anti-Gay Crusader and Her Gay Son Were Making It Work. Then Came Trump.
“A portrait of a modern family undone by the political zeitgeist.”
The Art of Balancing Immense Grief With a Rich Indoor Life
“What unites the two Americas — the sick and those who are staying home.”
The New York You Once Knew Is Gone. The One You Loved Remains.
In this pandemic-inspired variation on the Goodbye to All That essay, Glynnis MacNicol writes about what it’s like to have stayed in the current ghost town version of New York City when so many other New Yorkers have departed for greener pastures, and considers the city’s, and city-dwellers’ history of resilience through hard times.
My Journey Through Tijuana for the Best Surgery $2,000 Can Buy
In Tijuana, uninsured freelancers Amy Martyn and her husband Aaron pursue inexpensive orthopedic surgery for his doubly broken ankle. For both better and worse, they get what they paid for.
The Baron of Botox Is Gone, But His Face Lives On
A profile of late celebrity face master Dr. Fredric Brandt, who revolutionized cosmetic dermatology with the use of Botox and fillers, before dying by suicide in 2015.
‘I Believe in Love’: Elizabeth Wurtzel’s Final Year, In Her Own Words
Memoirist Elizabeth Wurtzel was working on this, her final personal essay, when she passed away on January 7th, 2020 from metastatic breast cancer. In the piece she reveals that as her health was declining, her marriage was unraveling, and that she was still wrestling with new information her mother finally revealed a couple of years ago: that her biological father was not the same man as the father she grew up with. With an introduction and end note from her editor and friend, Garance Franke-Ruta.
