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 […]
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Curator Spotlight: Vesna Jaksic Lowe on What It Means To Straddle Multiple Cultures
The writer of the Immigrant Strong newsletter wants to diversify your bookshelf.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, we’re sharing stories from Ta-Nehisi Coates, Katie Engelhart, Katy Vine, Zach Baron, and Colin Dickey.
Disbelieving What You Cannot See: A Reading List on Ableism and ‘Invisible’ Disability
Start your unlearning here.
Quarantine Brain: How ‘the Internet Became More Internet’ in 2020
Nothing made sense in 2020 — unless you were on the internet.
My Semester With the Snowflakes
A 52-year-old former Naval officer enrolls as an undergraduate at Yale, alongside a primarily 18- to 22-year-old student body. Contrary to what his contemporaries expect, in the midst of tackling complicated ideas with his classmates, despite their differences, he finds he has great respect for his them — and they have great respect for him.
The 19th-Century Hipster Who Pioneered Modern Sportswriting
More than a century before GoPro, Thomas Stevens’ around-the-world bike ride vaulted first-person “sports porn” into the mainstream.
The Rhythm of Writing: A Chat with the Writer and Editor Behind The Atavist’s New Issue
As host of The Creative Nonfiction Podcast, Brendan O’Meara is no stranger to talking about the art and craft of storytelling. In this craft-focused excerpt, we’re digging into Episode 336, in which he interviewed Atavist editor Jonah Ogles and freelance writer Cassidy Randall about her work on the latest issue of The Atavist. Cassidy Randall, a freelance writer based out […]
The Skeleton, the Meat, and the Bones: A Chat With the Writer and Editor Behind The Atavist’s New Issue
In this excerpt from The Creative Nonfiction Podcast, host Brendan O’Meara talks to Jana Meisenholder about writing “King of the Hill.”
The Many Decades of Bond
“How has someone who is a borderline rapist, murderer, and potential sociopath, endured through all these decades?”

