1.
“Jordan Neely Was Here” January 1–14
For New York’s latest cover story, Lisa Miller chronicled the life of a man whose strangling on the subway shocked the city. WNYC’s Brigid Bergin thanked Miller “for sharing Jordan Neely’s story with nuance and complexity.” “Whatever you think you know about #JordanNeely, whatever opinion you have, @lisaxmiller did the work putting the story together,” said author Chris Lombardi. On Instagram, jencourtjan called it “a powerful piece — such a detailed account of how mental illness (and homelessness and drug use, etc.) can be triggered and devolve over time until one day you wake up and it’s all come undone … No matter what your stance is on what happened on the train, this article is a heartbreaking reminder that all of the people we encounter on the streets have stories and most have family and friends that never stop caring for (or give up on) them.” Other readers were struck by what the story revealed about the city’s approach to mental illness and homelessness. Brian Stettin, the mayor’s senior adviser on severe mental illness, said he was “so glad I read this,” adding that the story reveals “Jordan’s full arc as a wounded human. The missed opportunities to change his trajectory should haunt us and strengthen our resolve to do better.” And Compact magazine’s Geoff Shullenberger commented on X that the article “basically confirms something people got savaged for saying on here at the time — that given the state he was in, the legal impossibility of confining him for treatment more or less guaranteed his life would end badly at some point.”
2.
“My Unraveling”
“My Unraveling,” Tom Scocca’s essay about the year he lost his job and his health, generated a remarkable outpouring from readers. “This piece ripped my heart open,” wrote the Washington Post’s Jenny Rogers. “It’s only the first week of 2024, but I know it will be one of the best things I read all year.” Slate’s Jenée Desmond-Harris added, “Only the very best writers can pull off a piece like this while living through hell.” Screenwriter Emily V. Gordon, whose film The Big Sick was inspired by her own experience with an autoimmune disorder, said, “This is what it’s like to go through life with an undiagnosed condition — everyone is in their own private hell but those hells are all in the same neighborhood.” Disability historian Aparna Nair called it “stunning writing, on the mysterious, agonizing and transformative experiences of illness and disability, the isolation, the fear,” adding, “Everyone should read this. Especially those abled who believe their able-bodiedness is eternal.” The New York Times’ Ellen Barry said, “I can’t stop thinking about this essay, by the ferociously talented @tomscocca, or about the terrifying underlying condition he identifies: how close we all are to free-fall when we get sick.” Novelist Lydia Kiesling praised it as “an incredible piece … about the frail mystery that is the body but also about the nightmare of our healthcare system, the fickleness of writing work & the precarity that is truly the bedrock of the majority of American lives.” Other journalists remarked on how the story indicted the state of the profession. Hamilton Nolan wrote, “Tom Scocca is one of the most careful, intelligent, incisive writers and editors I have ever worked with. The human toll of the collapse of the journalism industry haunts this (excellent) story.” “I don’t know anyone who worked with this man and wasn’t at least a little in awe of his brilliance as an editor and writer,” added HuffPost’s Dave Jamieson. “There’s really no one like him. What a shitty industry.” For Longreads, Peter Rubin said Scocca documented his illness “with grace and humor, but that doesn’t cushion the piece’s impact. This is no House episode; easy answers aren’t
waiting around the corner.” And for his Today in Tabs newsletter, Rusty Foster wrote, “I truly hope he can beat this. And the same goes for the rest of you who are going through something similar, because it’s a lot of us and it could be any of us.”
In Other News:
A few readers wrote to us noting the rather dour contents of the first
issue of the year. Karen Axelton said, “Between ‘Jordan Neely Was Here,’ ‘My Unraveling’ and ‘A Maui Love Story,’ New York is starting 2024 off with a gut punch. The takeaway: Whether you’re relying on the US healthcare system, mental health/homeless support system, or emergency response system, you’re on your own. Excellent reporting. But please keep balancing it with things like the delightfully fluffy 10-page Timothée Chalamet analysis.” Matthew Katz called the features “the grimmest combination of subjects ever to grace a magazine,” before adding, “Have a heart, and happy 2024.”
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