“Before Ryan Wedding landed on the FBI’s Most Wanted list as a high-level associate of El Chapo, he was a bright-eyed kid from Thunder Bay. The inside story of how an Olympic snowboarding prodigy became one of the world’s most dangerous and powerful drug lords.”
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Posted inTop 5
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Highlighting stories from Evan Malmgren, Thea Lim, Beth Raymer, Kasey Butcher Santana, and Nico Madrigal-Yankowski.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Tangled Justice
“A new book examines the complex relationship between forgiveness and justice through the story of Paula Cooper, who was sentenced to death at the age of sixteen.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
Experiences in Groups
“The more you can perceive, the more choice you will have about how to respond.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
Chrishona Hodges’s Life Sentence
“At a crossroads when Chicago profiled him nine years ago, Jerryon Stevens is now in jail, awaiting trial on a murder charge. At home, his mother reckons with her son’s path — and tries to hold her fractured family together.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Smallest Victims: Why Does America Keep Allowing Toddlers to Shoot Themselves?
“Nearly every day, a child unintentionally fires a gun and injures or kills someone. It’s one of the most preventable forms of gun violence—but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to solve.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
A Child Star at 7, in Prison at 22. Then She Vanished. What Happened to Lora Lee Michel?
“Hollywood is notorious for erasing people. But her sister and nieces refused to forget Lora Lee Michel.”
Posted inUncategorized
Our Sister’s Netflix Hit and the Week’s Top 5
“But all was not well in the house on the corner of Lincoln Road and 52nd Street. It belonged to Dennis and Brenda Bowman, a married couple with two children. For the Bowmans, March 11 marked the last time they saw their 14-year-old daughter, Aundria, alive.” We’ve got some big news this week from our […]
Posted inNewsletter
Help Us Stay a Home for the Weird
“Invite writers and readers in—magic will follow.” Six years ago, I published my first essay as an editor for Longreads. Margot Harris’s “Under the Knife” opens with a scene of cupcakes shaped like private parts (and goes on to discuss the guilt of having cosmetic surgery as a feminist). What a privilege, I thought at […]
Posted inNonfiction
‘We Deserve So Much More Than Police, Prisons, and Jails’: Scalawag Takes On Emmy-Winning Television
We recommend these incisive essays on Abbott Elementary, The White Lotus, and The Dropout in Scalawag’s series on pop culture and justice.
