Longreads
@longreads.com
Sharing and publishing the best longform stories at longreads.com since 2009. Sister site of @atavist.com.
Become a member: https://longreads.com/join/
Submit to us: https://longreads.com/submissions
Become a member: https://longreads.com/join/
Submit to us: https://longreads.com/submissions
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Longreads
@longreads.com
· Oct 15
Announcing Our 2025 Member Drive - Longreads
It's easy to think that thoughtful longform journalism is an endangered species. We refuse to believe that—and we need your help.
longreads.com
We’ve curated nearly 14,000 stories in the past 16 years and published hundreds of original pieces. Today, we’re kicking off a member drive to keep the stories coming.
Won’t you join us?
longreads.com/2025/10/15/2...
Won’t you join us?
longreads.com/2025/10/15/2...
Here's what we've got in our weekly Top 5:
* Appeal of the surreal @equatormag.bsky.social
* Decoding AI dreck (NYT Magazine)
* Goop relations @nplusonemag.com
* Learning to think @bostonreview.bsky.social
* Pigeon racing pitfalls @parisreview.bsky.social
longreads.com/2025/12/05/l...
* Appeal of the surreal @equatormag.bsky.social
* Decoding AI dreck (NYT Magazine)
* Goop relations @nplusonemag.com
* Learning to think @bostonreview.bsky.social
* Pigeon racing pitfalls @parisreview.bsky.social
longreads.com/2025/12/05/l...
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week - Longreads
In this edition: the appeal of the surreal, decoding AI dreck, goop relations, learning to think, and pigeon racing pitfalls
longreads.com
December 5, 2025 at 3:13 PM
Here's what we've got in our weekly Top 5:
* Appeal of the surreal @equatormag.bsky.social
* Decoding AI dreck (NYT Magazine)
* Goop relations @nplusonemag.com
* Learning to think @bostonreview.bsky.social
* Pigeon racing pitfalls @parisreview.bsky.social
longreads.com/2025/12/05/l...
* Appeal of the surreal @equatormag.bsky.social
* Decoding AI dreck (NYT Magazine)
* Goop relations @nplusonemag.com
* Learning to think @bostonreview.bsky.social
* Pigeon racing pitfalls @parisreview.bsky.social
longreads.com/2025/12/05/l...
"Did women have no choice, Wilcox wondered, but to wander the world hoping never to step on a landmine of a man?"
Read an excerpt from Christa Hillstrom's @atavist.com story about a nurse's quest to document the life and death of every woman killed by a man in the US.
longreads.com/2025/12/04/f...
Read an excerpt from Christa Hillstrom's @atavist.com story about a nurse's quest to document the life and death of every woman killed by a man in the US.
longreads.com/2025/12/04/f...
The Nurse Who Names the Dead - Longreads
Inside a Texas nurse’s quest to document the life and death of every woman killed by a man in America.
longreads.com
December 5, 2025 at 2:42 AM
"Did women have no choice, Wilcox wondered, but to wander the world hoping never to step on a landmine of a man?"
Read an excerpt from Christa Hillstrom's @atavist.com story about a nurse's quest to document the life and death of every woman killed by a man in the US.
longreads.com/2025/12/04/f...
Read an excerpt from Christa Hillstrom's @atavist.com story about a nurse's quest to document the life and death of every woman killed by a man in the US.
longreads.com/2025/12/04/f...
"All we needed was a poem, a few hours each week, and trust in what we could do, in what we did do, together." @johannawinant.bsky.social @bostonreview.bsky.social
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review
Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.
www.bostonreview.net
December 4, 2025 at 8:50 PM
"All we needed was a poem, a few hours each week, and trust in what we could do, in what we did do, together." @johannawinant.bsky.social @bostonreview.bsky.social
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
Reposted by Longreads
“I believed my #worth depended..on my #physical #capabilities. I may not have said it explicitly back then, but I feared I would lose that worth if I gave those things up, if I did something as ordinary as having a #child.”: buff.ly/kI2Xud3
via @longreads.com
#SelfWorth #motherhood
via @longreads.com
#SelfWorth #motherhood
What Is a Body For? - Longreads
One desire felt like it would make me more of who I already was, and the other would unmake me entirely.
buff.ly
December 4, 2025 at 11:30 AM
“I believed my #worth depended..on my #physical #capabilities. I may not have said it explicitly back then, but I feared I would lose that worth if I gave those things up, if I did something as ordinary as having a #child.”: buff.ly/kI2Xud3
via @longreads.com
#SelfWorth #motherhood
via @longreads.com
#SelfWorth #motherhood
Reposted by Longreads
This is one of the best pieces I've read about standing on the precipice of parenthood; the ambivalence about taking on the role of motherhood when you're ambivalent about womanhood in the first place -- and the transformation that happens once you leap and integrate your senses of self.
"I’ve learned the same lesson about desire again and again. Doing something I’ve dreamed of doesn’t necessarily check something off the list as much as it adds several more items to it."
For Longreads, Diana Saverin confronts the costs of motherhood.
longreads.com/2025/12/02/e...
For Longreads, Diana Saverin confronts the costs of motherhood.
longreads.com/2025/12/02/e...
What Is a Body For? - Longreads
One desire felt like it would make me more of who I already was, and the other would unmake me entirely.
longreads.com
December 3, 2025 at 9:31 PM
This is one of the best pieces I've read about standing on the precipice of parenthood; the ambivalence about taking on the role of motherhood when you're ambivalent about womanhood in the first place -- and the transformation that happens once you leap and integrate your senses of self.
"It seems we've reached the point in our relationship with celebrities where we just want to throw stuff at them . . . Like sending a satellite through a blackhole or petting a squirrel. It just seems worth a try." — @misternagel.bsky.social for Dirt
Very Important People
Mike Nagel on not being famous.
dirt.fyi
December 3, 2025 at 5:35 PM
"It seems we've reached the point in our relationship with celebrities where we just want to throw stuff at them . . . Like sending a satellite through a blackhole or petting a squirrel. It just seems worth a try." — @misternagel.bsky.social for Dirt
"Just as the sun begins to peek over the flat horizon of Coon Rapids, Iowa, 1,383 pigeons fill the sky." —Oliver Egger for @parisreview.bsky.social
www.theparisreview.org/blog/2025/11...
www.theparisreview.org/blog/2025/11...
Homeward Bound: On Pigeon Racing by Oliver Egger
November 26, 2025 – “Imagine being blindfolded and loaded in a car, then dropped nearly four hundred miles from your house in a random field in rural Iowa and trying to get home before dark. Oh, and…
www.theparisreview.org
December 3, 2025 at 3:20 PM
"Just as the sun begins to peek over the flat horizon of Coon Rapids, Iowa, 1,383 pigeons fill the sky." —Oliver Egger for @parisreview.bsky.social
www.theparisreview.org/blog/2025/11...
www.theparisreview.org/blog/2025/11...
"It was fine for me to lie by omission in order to report a story. But this was something different: I was no longer going to pretend to be a believer. I was going to pretend to believe." —Chandler Fritz for @countyhwy.bsky.social
Jesus Christ is Born in Texas | Chandler Fritz
America's Only Newspaper
www.countyhighway.com
December 2, 2025 at 5:35 PM
"It was fine for me to lie by omission in order to report a story. But this was something different: I was no longer going to pretend to be a believer. I was going to pretend to believe." —Chandler Fritz for @countyhwy.bsky.social
"I’ve learned the same lesson about desire again and again. Doing something I’ve dreamed of doesn’t necessarily check something off the list as much as it adds several more items to it."
For Longreads, Diana Saverin confronts the costs of motherhood.
longreads.com/2025/12/02/e...
For Longreads, Diana Saverin confronts the costs of motherhood.
longreads.com/2025/12/02/e...
What Is a Body For? - Longreads
One desire felt like it would make me more of who I already was, and the other would unmake me entirely.
longreads.com
December 2, 2025 at 4:06 PM
"I’ve learned the same lesson about desire again and again. Doing something I’ve dreamed of doesn’t necessarily check something off the list as much as it adds several more items to it."
For Longreads, Diana Saverin confronts the costs of motherhood.
longreads.com/2025/12/02/e...
For Longreads, Diana Saverin confronts the costs of motherhood.
longreads.com/2025/12/02/e...
"I found Fisher’s approach totally uncynical. His mission statement is simple and, in its simplicity, quite radical: We should enter conversations not to prove but to learn something." —Lamorna Ash for @thedialmag.bsky.social
www.thedial.world/articles/new...
www.thedial.world/articles/new...
Why Are We So Afraid of Conversation? — The Dial
A glut of self-help books promises to teach us to do it better.
www.thedial.world
November 26, 2025 at 7:28 PM
"I found Fisher’s approach totally uncynical. His mission statement is simple and, in its simplicity, quite radical: We should enter conversations not to prove but to learn something." —Lamorna Ash for @thedialmag.bsky.social
www.thedial.world/articles/new...
www.thedial.world/articles/new...
"It’s easy to project our fantasies onto a past that we can’t quite remember. The ad is seductive but transparent. We don’t believe the copy, but appreciate its innocence." —M.P. Kennedy for @publicbooks.bsky.social
Cool Enchantment - Public Books
The ad is seductive but transparent. We don’t believe the copy but appreciate its innocence.
www.publicbooks.org
November 26, 2025 at 5:35 PM
"It’s easy to project our fantasies onto a past that we can’t quite remember. The ad is seductive but transparent. We don’t believe the copy, but appreciate its innocence." —M.P. Kennedy for @publicbooks.bsky.social
Reposted by Longreads
I will never get tired of seeing Hanif Abdurraqib's writing show up at @longreads.com. Kudos @provenself.bsky.social and team on this series.
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
#longreads
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
#longreads
40 Years Later: Sade, “Promise” - Longreads
"Promise" isn’t necessarily about love, or even about surrender, but about giving your heart over, repeatedly, and enduring the failures that come with the exchange.
longreads.com
November 25, 2025 at 7:52 PM
I will never get tired of seeing Hanif Abdurraqib's writing show up at @longreads.com. Kudos @provenself.bsky.social and team on this series.
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
#longreads
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
#longreads
"I look at that, and I have affection for a young man. It’s a Saturday night, and I’m at a typewriter with the fucking headphones on. I’m putting in the work. I’m doing it."— @themountaingoats.bsky.social's John Darnielle to Grayson Haver Currin for @GQmagazine.bsky.social
The Story John Darnielle Lived to Tell
When he was a teenager, the Mountain Goats founder never expected to live to 21. He has since become one of this century’s best songwriters. The lessons of his survival, life, and work feel endless.
www.gq.com
November 24, 2025 at 8:16 PM
"I look at that, and I have affection for a young man. It’s a Saturday night, and I’m at a typewriter with the fucking headphones on. I’m putting in the work. I’m doing it."— @themountaingoats.bsky.social's John Darnielle to Grayson Haver Currin for @GQmagazine.bsky.social
"Being a foodie is no longer about experience and knowledge. Documentation is in; expertise is out, even if we can all cite Bourdain explaining that Sichuan food with Coke is the best way to cure a hangover." @aliciadkennedy.bsky.social @yalereview.bsky.social
yalereview.org/article/alic...
yalereview.org/article/alic...
Alicia Kennedy: “Who Was the Foodie?”
Alicia Kennedy on Ruby Tandoh’s All Consuming , Marion Nestle’s What to Eat Now , and the evolution of the foodie
yalereview.org
November 24, 2025 at 7:20 PM
"Being a foodie is no longer about experience and knowledge. Documentation is in; expertise is out, even if we can all cite Bourdain explaining that Sichuan food with Coke is the best way to cure a hangover." @aliciadkennedy.bsky.social @yalereview.bsky.social
yalereview.org/article/alic...
yalereview.org/article/alic...
This week's Top 5:
* Metal medicine, @highcountrynews.org
* Hyped humanoids, @harpers.bsky.social
* Carnival crossroads, @bittersouth.bsky.social
* Divine defiance, @placesjournal.bsky.social
* Optimization obsession, @aeon.co
longreads.com/2025/11/21/t...
* Metal medicine, @highcountrynews.org
* Hyped humanoids, @harpers.bsky.social
* Carnival crossroads, @bittersouth.bsky.social
* Divine defiance, @placesjournal.bsky.social
* Optimization obsession, @aeon.co
longreads.com/2025/11/21/t...
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week - Longreads
In this edition: metal medicine, hyped humanoids, carnival crossroads, divine defiance, and optimization obsession.
longreads.com
November 21, 2025 at 4:10 PM
This week's Top 5:
* Metal medicine, @highcountrynews.org
* Hyped humanoids, @harpers.bsky.social
* Carnival crossroads, @bittersouth.bsky.social
* Divine defiance, @placesjournal.bsky.social
* Optimization obsession, @aeon.co
longreads.com/2025/11/21/t...
* Metal medicine, @highcountrynews.org
* Hyped humanoids, @harpers.bsky.social
* Carnival crossroads, @bittersouth.bsky.social
* Divine defiance, @placesjournal.bsky.social
* Optimization obsession, @aeon.co
longreads.com/2025/11/21/t...
"Everything means something: if you close a window, you are trying to protect the group. If you’re sleepy, it’s because the group is making you sleepy. You do not have food poisoning; you have group poisoning." — @lilyscherlis.bsky.social for n+1
Experiences in Groups | Lily Scherlis
The more experienced attendees explain that here, one’s individual experience is seen as a symptom of the group’s dynamics. If someone is physically ill, it is because the system needs to eject…
www.nplusonemag.com
November 20, 2025 at 5:35 PM
"Everything means something: if you close a window, you are trying to protect the group. If you’re sleepy, it’s because the group is making you sleepy. You do not have food poisoning; you have group poisoning." — @lilyscherlis.bsky.social for n+1
"Yes, all of these things fade, and you step into the sun which, in a moment, will become a storm. But surely you wouldn’t swear off the sun for the rest of your life, would you?" Hanif Abdurraqib on Sade's album "Promise," 40 years later.
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
40 Years Later: Sade, “Promise” - Longreads
"Promise" isn’t necessarily about love, or even about surrender, but about giving your heart over, repeatedly, and enduring the failures that come with the exchange.
longreads.com
November 20, 2025 at 4:27 PM
"Yes, all of these things fade, and you step into the sun which, in a moment, will become a storm. But surely you wouldn’t swear off the sun for the rest of your life, would you?" Hanif Abdurraqib on Sade's album "Promise," 40 years later.
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
longreads.com/2025/11/20/s...
"The Moscow crew shipped off all those pizzas and 20 cases of Pepsi to the parliament building, to fortify Yeltsin and his supporters against the coup. Antoniadi had inserted Pizza Hut into a political crisis." —Kelly Jones & @joshuablevin.bsky.social for @slate.com
In 1990, One of the Great Forgotten Acts of American Subterfuge Unfolded. It Involved Pizza Hut.
A delicious caper of vodka bribes and world-altering salad bars.
slate.com
November 19, 2025 at 8:16 PM
"The Moscow crew shipped off all those pizzas and 20 cases of Pepsi to the parliament building, to fortify Yeltsin and his supporters against the coup. Antoniadi had inserted Pizza Hut into a political crisis." —Kelly Jones & @joshuablevin.bsky.social for @slate.com
"A printed diary held out the promise of total control over time, place and the self."
Elena Mary for @aeon.co: aeon.co/essays/victo...
Elena Mary for @aeon.co: aeon.co/essays/victo...
Victorian diary-writers kicked off our age of self-optimisation | Aeon Essays
Our cursed age of self-monitoring and optimisation didn’t start with big tech: as so often, the Victorians are to blame
aeon.co
November 18, 2025 at 11:18 PM
"A printed diary held out the promise of total control over time, place and the self."
Elena Mary for @aeon.co: aeon.co/essays/victo...
Elena Mary for @aeon.co: aeon.co/essays/victo...
America's liminal wetlands don't just persist, writes Ashley Stimpson. They insist. Today's inspiration for flagging resilience comes from a place you might not expect.
longreads.com/2025/10/02/t...
longreads.com/2025/10/02/t...
Swamp People - Longreads
Finding refuge and resilience in America’s most reviled landscapes.
longreads.com
November 18, 2025 at 3:21 PM
America's liminal wetlands don't just persist, writes Ashley Stimpson. They insist. Today's inspiration for flagging resilience comes from a place you might not expect.
longreads.com/2025/10/02/t...
longreads.com/2025/10/02/t...
"We tried to pin down what it was about Fire in the Mountains that still had us sobbing intermittently a week out. Von Till nailed it: 'It made me dare to hope.'” @btoastie.bsky.social @highcountrynews.org
www.hcn.org/issues/57-11...
www.hcn.org/issues/57-11...
Heavy metal is healing teens on the Blackfeet Nation - High Country News
In response to youth suicides, teachers show students the power of headbanging at Fire in the Mountains festival.
www.hcn.org
November 17, 2025 at 9:23 PM
"We tried to pin down what it was about Fire in the Mountains that still had us sobbing intermittently a week out. Von Till nailed it: 'It made me dare to hope.'” @btoastie.bsky.social @highcountrynews.org
www.hcn.org/issues/57-11...
www.hcn.org/issues/57-11...
"I think of the strata of the city and how its new skyscrapers are built on the bones of the old docks."
@jesstraynor.bsky.social for @thedialmag.bsky.social: www.thedial.world/articles/new...
@jesstraynor.bsky.social for @thedialmag.bsky.social: www.thedial.world/articles/new...
What US Tech Did to Ireland — The Dial
The country is alarmingly reliant on Meta, Google and Apple.
www.thedial.world
November 17, 2025 at 8:43 PM
"I think of the strata of the city and how its new skyscrapers are built on the bones of the old docks."
@jesstraynor.bsky.social for @thedialmag.bsky.social: www.thedial.world/articles/new...
@jesstraynor.bsky.social for @thedialmag.bsky.social: www.thedial.world/articles/new...
"The shipworms are many things at once. They have carried different names — from maritime menace to indigenous delicacy to scientific marvel — yet none alone captures their multitude."
@crystalcchow.bsky.social for The Contrapuntal: thecontrapuntal.com/are-these-cl...
@crystalcchow.bsky.social for The Contrapuntal: thecontrapuntal.com/are-these-cl...
Are These Clams Key to Climate Adaptation? - The Contrapuntal
Shipworms are touted as tomorrow’s superfood and miracle medicine. But the story of these tiny molluscs illustrates an intricate ecological complexity that flashy green solutions often ignore.
thecontrapuntal.com
November 17, 2025 at 7:05 PM
"The shipworms are many things at once. They have carried different names — from maritime menace to indigenous delicacy to scientific marvel — yet none alone captures their multitude."
@crystalcchow.bsky.social for The Contrapuntal: thecontrapuntal.com/are-these-cl...
@crystalcchow.bsky.social for The Contrapuntal: thecontrapuntal.com/are-these-cl...
"Actually preventing cancer—far preferable to curing it, if less interesting—would mean asking why our cancer rates are so high in the first place." —Sofi Thanhauser for @vqr.bsky.social
Profits and False Promises
In the eerie, quiet week between Christmas and New Year’s 2021, halfway through a Fulbright to Hungary, I went to a medical clinic in Budapest to have a lump in my breast examined. I wasn’t too…
www.vqronline.org
November 17, 2025 at 5:35 PM
"Actually preventing cancer—far preferable to curing it, if less interesting—would mean asking why our cancer rates are so high in the first place." —Sofi Thanhauser for @vqr.bsky.social
"It could be yet another sign that, between the poorly understood lemurs and their shifting environment, some equilibrium is slipping." —Elizabeth Preston for @biographic.bsky.social
www.biographic.com/investigatin...
www.biographic.com/investigatin...
Investigating a Treetop Baby Boom
Why a sudden spike in pregnancies in one Madagascan lemur population might actually be a bad sign for the species.
www.biographic.com
November 17, 2025 at 1:38 PM
"It could be yet another sign that, between the poorly understood lemurs and their shifting environment, some equilibrium is slipping." —Elizabeth Preston for @biographic.bsky.social
www.biographic.com/investigatin...
www.biographic.com/investigatin...