The Boys Who Loved Birds

Can an eco-corridor inhabit the no-man’s land that once separated Western Europe from the Eastern Bloc? Kai Frobel thinks so.

Published: Feb 18, 2015
Length: 40 minutes (10,100 words)

Damage

The author, who spent her childhood in Pakistan, underwent a female genital mutilation procedure when she was seven years old. Having lived in the States for many years as a young adult, she reflects on the effects of this procedure on her sexuality and her relationship to her family, especially her mother.

Published: Jan 14, 2015
Length: 42 minutes (10,508 words)

Latter-Day Saint

Maybe the hard road to self-acceptance is a road to God. A gay Mormon’s complicated journey.

Published: Jul 25, 2014
Length: 42 minutes (10,556 words)

Something More Wrong: Inside the Women’s Ward of a Psychiatric Hospital

Our recent Longreads Member Pick by Katy B. Olson and The Big Roundtable is now free online. Plus: Read our backstory on how Olson came to tell these patients’ stories.

Published: Jul 25, 2013
Length: 29 minutes (7,431 words)

Longreads Member Exclusive: Something More Wrong, by Katy B. Olson

This week’s Member Pick comes from The Big Roundtable, a new site for narrative journalism founded by Columbia University professor Michael Shapiro. And they’re giving Longreads Members early access to a brand new story, which won’t go live on their site until next week.

“Something More Wrong,” by Katy B. Olson, is an in-depth look inside the Creedmoor Psychiatric Center in Queens, New York.

Published: Jul 18, 2013