“What could it mean to give yourself the food you need to keep going? No punishing, no guilt, no withholding. Just nourishment.” Well hello, August! C’mon in and make yourself at home. This week, in addition to five stories chosen by the editors for our Top 5, we wanted to share two recent pieces with […]
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The Enduring Joy of Maps (and the Week’s Top 5)
“Empty spaces on maps were so terrifying to ancient mapmakers that they filled them with decorations, fictional landscapes, and monsters. We moderns miss the beautiful monsters, but what if they never actually disappeared? What if the monsters were always part of the map, part of mapping itself?” After many months of hearing about how great […]
Sob Stories, Movie Memes, and the Week’s Top 5
“While crying has featured in some of my most life-defining moments, I can also be set off anywhere, anytime, by almost anything. In the last week alone, I’ve cried looking at a social media account of a husky puppy and older cat (who are best friends), watching a sports documentary about a basketball team I […]
600? Is That Even Possible?
We like to think Longreads furnishes more than simply emergency reading, and that’s certainly true this week.
The Most Corrupt Cop in New Orleans and Our Weekly Top 5
“Murder is what landed Davis in court, but the victim wasn’t in the drug game. She was a single mother who had filed a brutality complaint against Davis. The next day, he ordered a hit man to kill her.” Congratulations, we’ve made it to the fifth month of 2024! For you, in addition to our […]
The (Un-)Happiest Place on Earth and the Week’s Top 5
“I left Trip House at 8:12 on Saturday morning, having not been murdered, and drove to the Magic Kingdom. The woman at the ticket window asked if I’d come to Disney World to celebrate anything special, and I laughed. If I answered that question truthfully — using unmagical words like ‘genital,’ ‘student loan,’ and ‘gentrification’ […]
Finding Strength in What’s Routine (and Our Top 5)
It’s a small miracle, I think, to experience a shift in perspective toward empathy. Being intentional about it is a small risk, a small assignment if you will, with the potential for a modest but meaningful personal reward.
A Trip to Twin Peaks and the Week’s Top 5
“I’d taken for granted how strange his work is—in the defiantly non-naturalistic performances he elicits from his actors and the surreal sheen of his stories and characters—until I started trying to explain the plot of Twin Peaks to Riley on our drive to Washington.” This week, we pay homage to director David Lynch, with Katherine […]


