Hi 👋 

We’re back again with another reading list of some of the best longform journalism across the internet ✨

I had a glorious week last week. I spent a lot of time absorbed in what I crudely call very-longreads: Longform stories that have no regard for word count and seemingly no respect for your time. They just stretch on and on and on, go on tangent after tangent, and get on an unbelievable level of detail.

My goodness I love those stories. Extremely easy to lose yourself in them.

I read a handful of those last week, and I’m sharing a few standout ones in this newsletter. So please let it slide that this list is shorter than usual 🙏

If last week’s newsletter somehow found its way into your spam or promos folder, here’s what you missed:

• Behind the first measles death in the U.S. in a decade.

• Solving a 48-year-old Cold War murder.

• Conservative hero or disgraced war criminal:

As with last week, please let me know what you think of the list this week by voting in the poll below.

Happy reading and see you again next Monday!

PS - Thanks again to Lulu for supporting this week’s newsletter. Please, please consider clicking their ad below the fold or in the banner above. It’s free and easy and is a huge help to TLR. Thank you so much!!

Story in Spotlight

I wish ProPublica would start doing these deep, sprawling features again, complete with well-produced visuals and web development.

(I understand that these types of stories are steep investments for newsrooms, and that’s likely a big reason why they don’t get done often. Unfortunate.)

ProPublica is built on a bedrock of solid, thorough reportage. And that’s on full display here. The story sets expectations upfront that it will be extremely detailed, something which the writers deliver on: They approach a single tragedy from multiple points of view, following a tenacious cast of characters through it, and sometimes even giving a granular, minute-by-minute recounting of events.

The result is an incredible gripping story that mercilessly holds your attention and demands to be re-read (this is really why I wasn’t able to go through as many longreads last week as I would have wanted to).

The story also zooms out a bit from the collision, looking at both the fraught history and incompetent leadership of the navy, as well as the personal backgrounds of the ship’s crew, as a way to explain the tragedy. It also provides a peek at what the fallout has been.

But if I’m being honest (and a bit nitpicky), I feel like some of the most important things were glossed over. The writers could have given more space for the overall systemic factors leading to the crash and sought for more structural accountability, rather than mining the crew’s individual histories.

Overall a really stellar article, though. Probably in my top three of all time in terms of maritime longreads.

Very, very long. But also very, very gripping. Found it hard to look away from it. But still allot 1 hour and 30 minutes, at least.

The Longform List

Sympathy for the Devil | Vanity Fair, $

Massive story with two flawed characters at the heart of it, wrapped in layers upon layers of deceit and violence, of hope and sympathy. Impressive empathy work here from the writer, who had the unenviable job of dredging up painful and traumatic memories but (at least it appears so) was able to do so carefully and kindly.

The Epic Hunt for One of the World’s Most Wanted Men | GQ, $

The ICC, in my opinion, is a flawed institution that by many measures has been weaponized by the rich and white powers-that-be to keep their poor and black or brown contemporaries in check. BUT that doesn’t mean that its work isn’t important (I just wish that it could apply its ambit consistently and equally).

This story follows one particularly triumphant moment for the international body, a validation that no matter how difficult or long or imperfect, the Court is nevertheless dogged in its pursuit of justice.

The Life and Mystery of Luigi Mangione | Rolling Stone, $

I saw somewhere online that this read a lot like a puff piece of Luigi (who I will concede is a polarizing figure). I don’t think I agree. This story paints him as a a complicated, nuanced person, but also holds a magnifying glass to his bro-ey, libertarian tendencies. Hardly a valorizing depiction of him.

To that end, I think a key weakness of this story is how it glossed over the purported reason for Luigi’s shooting, which is his frustration of the U.S. healthcare system. So much more could have been done here to flesh that out. Nevertheless a really gripping and enjoyable read.

Do We Need a New Theory of Evolution? | The Guardian, Free

Really compelling, particularly as someone who was formally educated in the life sciences. I have a deep interest in these types of historical accounts of how scientific ideas begin and change over time, and the political and personal forces that shape them. There’s a lot of that in this story, which also importantly highlights how these scientific squabbles of the past continue to affect the field now.

The Death of the Marlboro Man | TexasMonthly, $

Cookie-cutter profile, which isn’t something that I typically find too interesting (that’s why it’s so low on this week’s list). Still, the subject here at least grabs and holds the attention—a classic tale of someone who had a brush with prominence but who was unable to escape his troubled life. Really raw, really emotional. With an ending that is unsatisfying in the most satisfying way. If that makes sense.

The World’s Deadliest Infectious Disease Is About to Get Worse | The Atlantic, $

This is a book excerpt. Just want to say that upfront, to manage expectations.

For how limited it is, this article manages to lay out a convincing argument for how tuberculosis will soon be on the rise—and in a form that is more severe, more aggressive and more resistant to treatments than we have known. And that Trump’s recent assaults on public health will play a major part in this. I havem’t read the book yet, but I hope it goes deeper into this: It’s not just Trump. There are larger and more evergreen forces here that we need to understand.

Thanks for reading! Please, please reach out if you have feedback, suggestions, or questions. Alternatively, you can fill out this super quick survey form. I promise it won’t even take five minutes of your time, and it’ll be a HUGE help!

ALSO: I know some of the stories I recommend might be behind paywalls, and maybe I can help you with access to those. Send me a message and let’s see what we can do 😊

Until next Monday! 👋