“Former CIA master of disguise helps disfigured people come out of hiding”
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Mike Conner v. the Pain
“In 2013, a fire-sprinkler engineer fell five stories from the rafters of a church, shattered 108 bones, and almost died. Then began his battle to walk and live again.”
The Teeth Makers of Kandahar
Haji Muhammad Sultan owns a business in the center of Kandahar, Afghanistan’s second-largest city, dedicated to handcrafting high-quality dentures. Founded by his grandfather 80 years ago, the shop was a place that Sultan came as a child to learn the family craft; he became a military doctor during the U.S.-led occupation and made teeth for […]
The Mystery Behind the Crime Wave at 312 Riverside Drive
It sounds like a whodunit, but it’s anything but: One man placing multiple 911 calls every day, reporting crimes in progress at a building that doesn’t exist. The question isn’t who, but why — and David Wilson masterfully unpacks the turmoil living inside the man responsible, and the difficulty of helping him find a lasting stability. In […]
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, our editors recommend stories by Bushra Seddique, Simon van Zuylen-Wood, Laura Mauldin, Kathryn Miles, and Lucas Mann.
The Tragedy of Jayquan McKenley
From the current New York issue’s package on drill music comes this urgent, saddening profile of Jayquan McKenley, a sweethearted teenager and burgeoning artist whose murder sparked a new wave of handwringing around the rap subgenre. Even to drill’s defenders, it seemed clear that social media had sped up a cycle of retaliatory shootings; the Bronx’s […]
Odd, Genius, or Something In Between: A Reading List on Writers
“Give me the weird tics, the turns of phrase, the strange beginnings. Give me the writer in their natural habitat.”
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, our editors recommend stories by Caitlin Dickerson, Samira Shackle, Mitchell S. Jackson, Roberto José Andrade Franco, and Ian Dille.
Patrick Radden Keefe Gets to the Bottom of It
If you’re a sucker for hearing how great journalists report and structure their work — and who isn’t? — this Q&A with New Yorker write-around specialist Patrick Radden Keefe makes for a perfect Monday read. It’s always the same: It starts with a series of big beats. If it’s an article, it starts with eight […]
Gary Smith, Master of the Sports Longform, Left at the Very Top. Why?
The latest in SI‘s “Where Are They Now?” series covers longtime staffer Smith, arguably one of the finest profilers the journalism world has ever known. His portraits of Mike Tyson, Andre Agassi, and other icons cut through the insularity of sports fandom to become the stuff of magazine legend. Now, Joseph Bien-Kahn heads to South […]
