This week’s top 5 long reads

In this week’s issue:

• Immigrant stories about the growing number of Haitian refugee children traveling alone by boat
• Dive into the complex world of romance scams
• Profile of beloved former REM frontman Michael Stipe
• A hybrid of memoir, fiction, and essays on Wikipedia, knowledge, and truth.
• A writer’s love letter to Southern restaurants that serve gasoline

Seth Fried Wessler | ProPublica | December 7, 2023 | 8,359 words

Since summer 2021, the U.S. Coast Guard has detained more than 27,000 people at sea, including an alarming number of Haitian refugee children traveling alone. Migration policies at sea differ from those on land: asylum does not apply at sea, and the system in place is opaque and dangerously inconsistent, Seth Fried Wessler reports. Coast Guard entry patrols often close off journalists, but Mr. Wessler obtained internal documents about one boat carrying a group of Haitians detained in March. There were three unaccompanied children on board: a 10-year-old boy and sisters aged 8 and 4. They tracked these children and 18 others from the boat. He beautifully describes his experiences from his boy’s perspective. Cherry began her journey from a smuggler’s home in the Bahamas, enduring 12 hours in the cabin of a shabby, overcrowded boat. His plan was for him to land in Florida and then somehow make his way to Canada to join his mother. (There are a lot of heartbreaking details in this story, but what sticks out in my mind is that some of the children on this ship are so young that they don’t even know their parents’ names or the country of their birth. ) After five days at sea, the Coast Guard has no choice but to send Cherry and the two girls back to Haiti. As Wessler points out, detention at sea doesn’t just leave a scar on refugees. The job also takes its toll on members of the Coast Guard. For example, the police officer during the conflict encounters Cherry and the girls on the boat, and they wonder what happened to them. A heartbreaking investigation into the migrant crisis at Florida’s maritime border. —CLR

Stuart McGuirk | The New Politician | December 7, 2023 | 6,664 words

Online dating is a daunting world. There are many questions to consider about who the app takes out of the virtual space and appears on screen as a potential partner. Can you connect? Are you funny? are those your real teeth? But today, one question is most important: are you real? Romance scams are the fastest growing category of scams, as Stuart McGuirk explains in this fascinating article. Last year, that proportion increased by almost a third, and now stands at a staggering two in five online daters who are asked for money, and half of them have paid. (These kinds of statistics seem destined to increase with the rise of AI.) McGuirk introduces us to Officer Rebecca Mason, a detective who works 20-plus hour investigative shifts to track down online scammers. Masu. I can see why she cares so much. Her heart breaks when she meets the victims. In Alan Baldwin’s case, the need to believe is so strong that when Mason announces the news, the person he loves and has been sending money to… 15 years It doesn’t exist, he won’t believe it. These scams target people who are emotionally vulnerable, desperate for connection, and desperate to help their loved ones. Particularly chilling is the substantive description of his chats in his WhatsApp group on the scam network. Just as young girls get together to discuss the best replies to send to their crushes, scammers talk about what kind of replies will nail their targets. That’s a disgusting thought. McGuirk has distilled Mason’s meticulous work and series of online messages into a convincingly clear and incisive work leading up to the trial and conviction. (If you want to learn more about dating scams, we highly recommend our sister publication’s special feature. alienist: “Romance scammer on the couch.”) —C.W.

John Moolem | New York Times Magazine | December 3, 2023 | 7,960 words

To say I was excited after reading this profile would be an understatement. REM is my favorite band. (“Nightswimming” is my favorite song. It’s a sentimental choice, but I own it anyway.) And I wasn’t disappointed. Stipe’s 87-year-old mother, Taylor Swift, and most importantly, Patti Smith, one of his best friends, make fun appearances. The story of how Smith and Stipe met is an old one. He got her phone number from a friend of hers and called her from a bar in Spain on her first Valentine’s Day after Smith’s husband died. Because I thought it might be a good idea. “I’m not going to call you unless you’re totally drunk on absinthe,” he told her. Little did I know Smith was into me just by watching MTV. (Same thing, Patti.) But the best part of this profile is how author John Moallem captures Stipe’s unique energy, which is simultaneously brilliant and humbling. One of the greatest frontmen in pop music history is working on his first solo album, one that taps into a forever restless mind, overcomes self-doubt, and forces himself away from a life surrounded by friends and family. means to leave. Fiercely devoted. “He knew he had to isolate in one of the buildings on his property,” Moalem wrote. “I walked in circles for six or eight or 10 hours at a time, doing trance-like meditation, and squeezed out the rest of the lyrics,” one line at a time. ” For now, Stipe’s work-in-progress songs are stored on his laptop in a folder called “Master Files.” Solo album. ” That pop song you just heard? It makes my heart explode. —SD

Ben Lerner | harpers magazine | November 20, 2023 | 8,414 words

To be honest, I’m not sure if this can be called non-fiction, but you can tell by the eyebrows above the heading “Experiment” what’s coming, but I do I know it’s the most boldly executed piece of work I’ve read this week. On the surface, the story details how Lerner moved across the country in his mid-20s to work as a “new media fellow” for a progressive think tank, and ended up launching a disinformation campaign via Wikipedia. This is a memoir. There’s only one problem he has. He destabilizes our experience at every turn. His memory is flawed, he told us. he is lying The details are incorrect. Lerner is best known for his literary fiction (actually autofiction) and poetry, both of which form the core of this work. It’s a dizzying, disorienting read, but so cleverly constructed and beautifully written that you can’t help but read on. Even if he makes up details or misremembers, it all still applies. At least it seems like it is, and that’s the point. We have built a system in which establishing facts is simply a function of constructing a correct illusion. Unreliable narrators come and go, providing an intermittent flurry of philosophical debate. What debt do writers owe to tell the truth? But in this period of transition, when the black box of artificial intelligence is beginning to reshape the web of text, it is far more troubling to realize that it is not only the storyteller who cannot be trusted, but the architect as well. —PR

Keith Laymon Bitter Southerner | December 6, 2023 | 1,914 words

bitter southerner I just published Kate Medley. Thank you and please come again: How gas stations feed and fuel the American South, a “photo road trip” documenting gas stations, convenience stores, and pit stops throughout the South. This essay by Kiese Laymon is the preface to the book. At one point, I seriously considered writing a recommendation for this work. “Keith Laymon. That’s all you need to know.” But that would rob me of the opportunity to reread and enjoy the benefits of this essay. If you don’t know Raymond’s work, please read this one. Here he is as a child in 1984, and his grandmother and their boy-girlfriend’s offer at Junior’s Mart, his diner, his convenience store, and his gas station in Forest, Mississippi. It reminds me of the Friday nights we spent together. “I loved everything about where we were going,” he wrote. “I loved the smell of fried food. I loved that the sign had red in it. I loved the way yellow and red went together. I loved that the restaurant’s name started with Junior instead of ending with Junior. I loved it. Like Food Mart Junior.” A fascinating read about anticipation, finding joy in unexpected places, and the long hours at minimum wage that made that joy possible. At Junior Food Mart, Raymond, his grandmother, and Offa D got more than fried fish and tattoo logs for a delicious Friday night dinner. They received a great deal of love and care, and history lived on. —K.S.