Longreads has been connecting readers with high quality tales since 2009, and since becoming a member of Automattic in 2014, we’ve published more than 100 pieces of unique reporting, essays, and e-book excerpts from gifted writers and reporters from throughout the globe. Listed here are 5.
“Violet,” by Adele Oliveira
Illustration by: Kjell Reigstad
Violet was born at 25 weeks and 5 days—greater than three months forward of her due date. This can be a story about turning into mother and father within the face of uncertainty.
I didn’t assume I might deal with the loss. However once I noticed my daughter’s tiny pink physique beneath saran wrap on a tilted, flat mattress, a thousand cords and wires hooked up to her chest, her eyes not but open, and a ventilator respiration for her, I used to be not stunned to seek out that I beloved her instantly. I knew I’d by no means love anybody extra, and I knew I’d all the time miss her if she died.
“The Fullness of a Moment,” by Jaime Green
Photograph Courtesy: American Museum of Pure Historical past
Half a century in the past, the Corridor of New York State Setting within the American Museum of Pure Historical past was not solely the way forward for museum design, but in addition, one man hoped, the way forward for democracy itself.
Many issues listed here are pretty or candy, however virtually nothing is gorgeous. Nothing lovely, nothing huge, nothing cool. And nothing new. In a museum that in any other case exhibits guests probably the most awe-inspiring science in probably the most trendy and attention-grabbing methods, right here is science of probably the most bizarre issues on the earth, the science of your humble yard. But it’s within the firm of blue whales and cosmic wonders, this homeliest and homiest of halls.
“The Freelancers’ Roundtable,” by Eva Holland
Illustration by: Kjell Reigstad
A dialog between veteran freelancers Eva Holland, Josh Dean, Jason Fagone, and Might Jeong about pitching tales, negotiating contracts, and breaking into a troublesome business.
Josh Dean: I feel we’re in all probability all going to agree that discovering concepts is the only hardest factor about this job. It’s certainly the only hardest factor about any sort of writing, at the least when you get some expertise and have constructed sufficient of a fame to get previous the gatekeepers. I can think about that if there have been a really younger and new author on this group, she or he would say that getting consideration, getting concepts checked out, is the arduous half.
“The Queen of the Night,” by Alexander Chee
Illustration by Carl J. Ferrero, Design by Sarah Samudre
The primary chapter from Alexander Chee’s much-anticipated second novel.
When it started, it started as an opera would start, in a palace, at a ball, in an encounter with a stranger who, you uncover, has your destiny in his palms. He’s maybe a demon or a god in disguise, offering you an opportunity at both the achievement of a dream or a lure for the soul. A comic book factor—the soprano arrives within the fallacious gown—and it decides her destiny.
“Rebel Virgins and Desert Mothers,” by Alex Mar
Illustration by Matt Lubchansky
In partnership with Atlas Obscura, we produced this story concerning the radical ladies of early Christianity.
Most of the feminine leaders of Christianity—within the Catholic Church particularly, with its 1.25 billion followers around the globe—are barred from being absolutely ordained and are intently overseen by males. However this was not all the time the case. Scores of early Christian ladies—like Marcella, the desert-dwelling Susan, or the students Melania and Paula—embraced radical lives, serving to the younger faith fan out throughout the Roman Empire and past.
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