From Powells.com
Staff Pick
If you like longform journalism, reading Love and Ruin is like devouring a box of the finest chocolates. The collection brings together 10 outstanding pieces from the award-winning digital publication The Atavist, from authors like Leslie Jamison, Vanessa Veselka, and James Verini. Recommended By Renee P., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
Extraordinary stories of crime, passion, and adventure from The Atavist magazine, the trailblazing leader in longform narrative writing.
Since its inception, The Atavist Magazine has been a pioneer of today’s longform journalism renaissance. Now, Love and Ruin brings ten of the magazine’s most astonishing stories into print for the first time. These writers have taken reporting to the extremes of nature, turned inward to explore what makes us human, and burrowed deep into archives in search of mysterious figures and events more surprising than anything in contemporary fiction. What unifies these nonfiction masterpieces is the keen eye with which their writers capture the details of human experience, and their knack for hooking us into a story and never letting go.
With stories by:
James Verini, Leslie Jamison, Vanessa Veselka, Jon Mooallem, Cris Beam, Brooke Jarvis, David Dobbs, Adam Higginbotham, Evan Ratliff, Matthew Shaer
Review
"Love and Ruin is tightly packed with the kind of stories that stay in your mind for a long time—stories that come alive in the kind of hard, clean sentences I remembering marveling at as a teenager devouring the stories of Truman Capote and Lillian Ross for the first time." Nancy Jo Sales
Review
"A mesmerizing collection, as lush and moving and full of astonishments as any I’ve read. It reflects the now-vital place of The Atavist in our literary firmament, a digital enterprise populated by some of the very best writers today, obsessed with the written word and new ways of telling stories. This is longform at its best, nonfiction mini-novellas that grip and cajole; rollick and surprise; illuminate and carry you on a journey to where truth and emotion are supersaturated, to where the gems glow in plain sight, there for the taking." Michael Paterniti
Review
"The Atavist is to digital long-form journalism what the first season of 'Serial' was to podcasting: a pioneering force for compelling, in-depth storytelling in an age of sound bites, hot takes and clickbait." Laura Pearson, Chicago Tribune
About the Author
Evan Ratliff is the editor of The Atavist magazine. His writing has appeared in Wired, where he is a contributing editor; The New Yorker; National Geographic; and other publications. He is also the story editor of Pop-Up Magazine, a live event.