2023
"Can 3D Printing Help Solve the Housing Crisis?” - on a proposed technological solution to the housing crisis
Letters from the Southwest: Tribal nations and the future of water in the Southwest; the Mexican fire crew fighting fires in the U.S.; the wild world of gem & mineral dealers in Tucson; exotic animal ownership in Texas; teen fentanyl deaths; Waco; the Texas gay rodeo; cow mutilation conspiracies; sotol and the marketing of the “next mezcal”
2022
“The Bodies in the Cave” - on the battle to control the remains of Native people in Texas
Letters from the Southwest: Terry Allen; NFTs in Marfa; Trump merch sellers; Texas’s screwed up power grid; Beto; trans kids under attack; Winter Texans; looking back on a failed militia movement; the National Guard soldiers attempting to unionize; the YouTuber exposing crypto scams; the failures of Title 42; a dispatch from Uvalde; Uvalde’s newspaper covers the worst day of their lives; Texas Republicans and gun control; the suburban water wars; barbecue inflation; one man’s search for missing migrants; going back to school in Uvalde; Beto and abortion; the amateur predator-hunters of YouTube; the estate sale queen of Dallas; why Arizona is a hotbed of election conspiracies; election day in Maricopa County; the fight for a new national monument in Texas; water negotiators go to Las Vegas.
2021
Letters from the Southwest: The booming market in old trucks; a school board controversy in Scottsdale.
“The Go-Between” - on the emerging field of ransomware negotiation (New Yorker)
“The Criminal Minds of Jim & Tim” - on the brothers, both ex-FBI agents, who are rebooting America’s Most Wanted (New York)
“Ultra-fast Fashion Is Eating the World” - on the fashion industry’s quest to get faster, cheaper, and trendier (The Atlantic)
“I’m Not a Soldier But I Have Been Trained to Kill” - on the tactical training industry and the militarization of civilians (Wired)
2020
“98 Million TikTok Followers Can’t Be Wrong” - on Charli D’Amelio and the new world of teen fame (The Atlantic)
“How to Spot a Military Imposter” - on military phonies and the online detectives who track them down (The New Yorker)
“Who Has the Right to Shelter in a Small Town?” - on coronavirus and gentrification in Marfa, Texas (The Atlantic)
“The Killing of a Colorado Rancher” - on a young man who went missing, and his friends who tried to find him (The Atlantic)
“Elon Musk, His Rocket, and the Grand Scheme That Tore Apart a Texas Town” - on SpaceX’s attempts to take over a beach community (Esquire)
2019
“The 10,000 Year Clock Being Built in Texas” - on the Clock of the Long Now (New York Times)
“On the Nose” - on the rise of natural wine (New Yorker)
“When GoFundMe Gets Ugly” - on the moral complexities of the world’s biggest crowdfunding site (The Atlantic)
“The Con Man Who Became a True-Crime Writer” - on a notorious scammer’s attempt at reinvention (The Atlantic)
“Murder in the Moroccan Mountains” - on the aftermath of an attack by ISIS sympathizers (Outside)
“Murder They Wrote” - on true crime, self-help, and the My Favorite Murder phenomenon (Bookforum)
“Can an Art Collective Become the Disney of the Experience Economy?” - on creative corporation Meow Wolf (New York Times Magazine)
“The Bulletproof Coffee Founder Has Spent $1 Million in His Quest to Live to 180” - on biohacking and butter coffee (Men’s Health)
2018
"The Perfect Man Who Wasn't" - on a romance scammer and the women who banded together to help take him down (The Atlantic)
“The FBI of the National Park Service” - on the small group of special agents tasked with handling major crimes committed in national parks (Outside)
"The Delay" - on the abduction of a Navajo girl and issues with Amber Alerts on reservations (Esquire)
“Now Damien Echols Will Teach You the Secrets of Magick” - on a member of the West Memphis Three reinventing himself after spending nearly 20 years on death row (New York Times)
2017
"#Vanlife" - on a life that became a lifestyle brand (New Yorker)
One of the New Yorker's most-read stories in 2017
"Something in the Air" - on essential oils as a cure for our age of anxiety (New Yorker)
"Outside the Manson Pinkberry" - on murder fandom and being a sad teen (The Believer)
Selected as one of the year's best essays by Longform; featured in Best American Travel Writing 2018
"How Rich Hippies and Developers Went to War Over Instagram's Favorite Beach" - on land disputes in Tulum (The Guardian)
"Sexual Assault in the Amazon" - on ayahuasca, tourism, money, and power (The Cut)
"Gone Baby Gone" - on a new breed of real estate investor destroying America's cities (The New Republic)
2016
"From Pickup Artist to Pariah" - on an Asheville man who was cancelled because of his secret life as a pick-up artist (The Cut)
Selected as one of the year's best by the Atlantic
"Crossed Stitches" - on quilt drama in small-town Texas (Texas Monthly)
"Meet the Internet Hoax Buster" - on cancer fakers and the internet detective who tracks them down (The Guardian)
"The Cat Psychic" - on animal communication and the problem of separate minds (Hazlitt)
"Monkeywrench" - on activists making a climate apocalypse musical in Florida (Oxford American)
"What it's Like to Play Tinder in Rural America" - on dating apps and small towns (Fusion)
"Drive Not Ride" - on motorcycles and heartbreak (The Awl)
2015
"Have You Ever Thought About Killing Someone" - on a murder in Big Bend National Park (Matter)
Selected as one of the year's best by Longreads, Jezebel, Enchantress, & Autostraddle; nominated for a Livingston Award. You can also read an annotated version of this story via Nieman Storyboard.
"The Fault" - on Gary Gilmore, Norman Mailer, and astrology (Gawker)
"That Drifting Place" - on Roy Orbison's glasses (Oxford American)
"Letter of Recommendation: The 'Death in...' Books" - on morbidly sublime stories about death in national parks (New York Times Magazine)
"After 19 Books and a Presidential Bid, Eileen Myles Gets [Their] Due" - an interview with the poet/rabblerouser Eileen Myles (New York)
"How Wal-Mart Became the Town Square in Rural America" - on a big store in a small town (Splinter)
"How George RR Martin is Helping Stem Santa Fe's Youth Exodus" - on the Game of Thrones author's partnership with the art collective Meow Wolf (The Guardian)
earlier
"Fire Behavior" - on the aftermath of the West, TX fertilizer plant explosion (Oxford American)
Selected as one of the year's best by Longform & the Atlantic
"My Backseat View of a Great Romance" - a Modern Love column on a Moroccan taxi cab romance (New York Times)
featured on the Modern Love podcast
"Murder in the Texas Desert" - on a murder in a Texas ghost town (Outside)
"Killer Crush" - on the horror of teen girl crushes, from Columbiners to Beliebers (The Awl)
"Fire Bugs" - on firefighters who set things on fire (The Awl)
“All My Friends Are in My Head" - on tulpas, Reddit, and imaginary friends (The Awl)
"House Ghosts" - on AIDS, gentrification, and haunted houses (The Awl)
"Tell Me What to Do" - on homesteading pioneers Scott & Helen Nearing (The Believer)
"Festival Showcases a Lifestyle Lost by Closing a Border" - on a fiesta protesta along the US/Mexico border (New York Times)
"Betraying Gideon in Alpine, Texas" - on the federal public defender crisis along the US/Mexico border (Al Jazeera America)
"More Guests, Empty Houses" - on share economy gentrification in Marfa, Texas (Slate)
"Working in a Moneyless World" - on Twin Oaks, a Virginia commune (Salon)
"Fire School" - on heroes, emergencies, and 10-foot flames (The Rumpus)
"Memory Wound" - on Anders Brevik and the massacre on Utoya (Los Angeles Review of Books)
"Common Ground" - a review of Brenda Stevenson's The Contested Murder of Latasha Harlins (Los Angeles Review of Books)
ALSO featured in some cool things that you can only get IRL: Hallways of Always; Desert Oracle; Summer Forum/Dilettante; Marfa Myths 2016 zine
