Shadow of a Doubt: How OCD Came to Haunt American Life

My cover story in the July 2025 Harper's—on OCD, San Francisco, psychiatry, tech, and the way we live now. Read it here.

The Last Cowboys: What It's
Like to Be a Trucker in the 21st
Century

A feature I wrote for Wired about my immersion in the world of American trucking—a journey that led me from a trucker chapel in northern Illinois to the Everglades, where I went with a driver on a route, riding shotgun. Read it here.

Mormonism's Sci-Fi Swan Song

An essay jointly funded and published by Longreads and The Point—on Mormonism, science fiction, and the finale of the largest outdoor theater event in America. Read it here.

Academe's Extinction Event

An essay I wrote for The Chronicle of Higher Education on the apocalypse of the humanities. Read it here.

The Joke's Over

An article I wrote for The Chronicle of Higher Education about the fate of academic satire—and satire more broadly—in the early twenty-first century. Read it here.

Wrestling in Paris

A piece I wrote for The Point on the 2017 World Wrestling Championships in Paris. Read it here.

The Woodstock of Fitness

A piece I wrote for Esquire's print magazine on the 2018 CrossFit Games.

Pilgrim at Tinder Creek

An essay I wrote for The Point about online dating and the academic job search. Read it here.

Staring into the Soundless Dark

An essay I wrote for The Millions about insomniac poets and their bedroom hang-ups. A meditation on sleep, death, sex, and impermanence. Read it here.

Writing After Academe

An essay I wrote for The Chronicle of Higher Education about leaving academia to explore more popular forms of writing. Read it here.