Naomi Arnold is the journalist behind featured.org.nz, a website that collates all the great features from publications New Zealand and around the world. She picked six recent ones for us from overseas.
Naomi Arnold Photo: supplied
The Last Day of Her Life
New York Times Magazine
May 2015
Robin Marantz Henig
I like this one because it is so simply told, which belies a great deal of sensitive reporting. The ending in particular is a wonderful exercise in restraint. This is a quiet family story, not a public fight for the right to die.
The Old Man at Burning Man
GQ
August 2015
Wells Tower
"A beautifully written piece of trash," according to one Burning Man festival goer. I include it because it's seriously beautifully written prose, where the reporter is interloper.
Just Get Us in the Room - The Women of Hollywood Speak Out
New York Times magazine
Nov 2015
Maureen Dowd
Hugely necessary piece on that ridiculous industry that controls so much of our lives. She got some great quotes on the record, coupled with brilliant portraits.
The Life and Times of Strider Wolf
The Boston Globe
Sarah Schweitzer, images Jessica Rinaldi
Amazing reporting, simply told. It goes deeply into the boy's head as smooth as fiction. Also really nicely presented on the web (is it so hard?)
The Witness
Texas Monthly
Pamela Colloff
Sept 2014
Texas has fantastic longform reporting. Here is one such story.
The Really Big One
The New Yorker
Kathryn Schulz
July 2015
Great science reporting that made huge waves in the States and countered all that San Andreas ridiculousness about at the time. Just a great narrative that builds its terror slowly.
