Best journalism of 2015

I read a lot. On my phone, on my laptop, in print newspapers, paper magazines, books, Kindle, whatever ya got. I've been a journalist ever since 1989, and one of the J-school classes that stuck with me was Journalism as Literature, where we studied and learned from stories that went beyond the work that can be done on a daily deadline, and focused on the most stunning, novelistic works from writers who go above and beyond in their chosen profession.

Here, then, are my completely opinionated picks for the top 3 journalistic pieces of the year. I can promise you that they will all stay with you, floating around in your mind and surfacing at the oddest times.

1. "The Life and Times of Strider Wolf"
No story touched me this year like Sarah Schweitzer's piece on young Strider Wolf that ran in the Boston Globe. A kindergartner named after a Tolkien character and a T-shirt, born to a couple that was in no way prepared to be parents, beaten nearly to death by his mother's boyfriend and now being raised by his troubled father's impoverished parents -- poor Strider and his brother just never had a chance. His situation has always been out of his tiny little hands, and it about broke my heart when he successfully won a bet with his grandmother's husband to get "all smiley faces" from his teacher, and then the family couldn't even afford to get him the ice-cream cone he won fair and square. There are a number of web pages out there raising money for Strider and his family now. I hope he gets his ice-cream cone, and more.

2. "After a Mass Shooting, a Survivor's Life"
Everything Eli Saslow writes is better than 90% of anything any other journalist writes. It just is. He's a rare gem. This Washington Post piece tells about what happens to those who survive a mass shooting, after the headlines fade and the press all chases after the next horrible event. It's about Oregon college student Cheyeanne Fitzgerald, 16, and her mother's desperate attempts to help her regain her life. It was only her fourth day of college.

3. "Biography of a Face"
Steve Fishman writes for New York Magazine about a fireman whose own burned-off face was replaced by that of a Brooklyn bike mechanic. It sounds like a Vincent Price movie from the 1960s, but it will touch you. Fishman weaves together the lives of both men and the way they come together beautifully. The photos of Patrick Hardison after his burns and before his transplant are tough to look at, but the story of his new face is amazing and how it came to be is amazing--and not as straightforward as you might think

Fake text can be fascinating

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That's filler text, and if you've done any kind of journalism, design or layout work, you know it well. (If you're lucky, you never forgot and left it in a document and had it published live.)

But do you know what it means, or why we use it? Read on.

Poor Cicero sure had a bloody death and aftermath, huh?

The torturer who doesn't feel sorry

If you're not already addicted to the wonderful work collected at Longreads, you should sign up for their newsletters or follow their Twitter feed.

I've always been fascinated with the Khmer Rouge and their bloody history in Cambodia, and the horrors of Prison S-21, which in more innocent days was once a high school. Imagine traveling into that buildings past and seeing the students going to class there, laughing with friends. Then imagine telling them, somehow making them understand that the place where they're sitting in peace and friendship will be as infamous as Auschwitz one day. Could they ever understand it? Can we today?

Rithy Panh not only survived the Killing Fields of Cambodia, he interviewed Duch, its notorious commandant. This story is both horrible and necessary.

Shattered Glass

This article came out in January, but I find it fascinating. The journalist who helps bring down Stephen Glass talked about where Glass is today.

Catching up

Yes, I've fallen way out of step as far as updating this blog. Part of it is that Blogger is so clunky to use to update when sites like Facebook and Twitter let you update with practically one click, even displaying the photo from your chosen story without you having to go get it. So if there's a blog product that works as easily as adding links to Facebook, let me know.

Anyway, here are a few of my recent stories for work, which transformed from msnbc.com to NBC News.com over the summer.

• Your guide to Hollywood's holiday offerings
• 'Doctor Who' stamps to honor all 11 Doctors
• Year in movies: Time to punch a wolf
• Is 'Christmas Shoes' the worst holiday song ever?
• 'Hall bitten by Oates' story sparks 'Maneater' headline
• Singer turns Stanley Steemer jingle into dazzling romp
• Toothbrushing doofus stars in worst commercial of year

Losing a brother

Tim Brown is a sportswriter, but this article has nothing to do with sports. It's about the real headlines in people's lives. He lost a brother just before Christmas in a car accident, and he's trying to come to grips with his new normal. Worth a read.

The Lives They Lived

I would read a million of these everyday people remembrances if the NY Times (or anyone) would write them. (Of course they have obituaries, but these put them in regular feature-story form.)

I'm just so much more interested in what everyday people did in their lives for the most part than the uber-rich and famous. The WW II artilleryman who survived by doing the unsafe thing, the mother whose children had to decide what to do with a six-foot modeling portrait of her in a bridal gown, the man who fought back against the violent all-night pubs of his town. Fascinating.

When writers collide

For a while, I was all but obsessed with Melanie Thernstrom's "The Dead Girl," the book she wrote about the murder of her high school best friend, Bibi Lee.

She also wrote "Halfway Heaven," about a murder at Harvard where a student from Africa murdered her roommate, from Vietnam, because she felt her moving away from her and desperately wanted a friend.

But I was floored to come across Thernstrom's name in this Beth Karas story, about plaigiarist Steven Glass, and to find her not only defending him, but having chosen him as godfather to her children. Reading it does give you a picture of Glass that you certainly don't get from the Hayden Christiansen portrayal in "Shattered Glass." His parents sound cold and horrible, though they do not speak to defend themselves in the article, so who knows?

I don't think we're in Kansas anymore

I once interviewed for (and didn't get) a job at the Utne Reader, which was then located right above the Loring Cafe on the edge of downtown Minneapolis.

I can believe that the staff refused to move to Topeka.

We are journalists

I love "We Are Journalists," the site where journalists explain why we do what we do.

This one is a favorite: "I lived in 13 cities between the age of 18 and 40. In journalism, in order to move up you’ve got to move. I’ve covered a Super Bowl, an execution and the Indian tsunami. I’ve asked priests if they molested children. Sometimes, they confessed. I love being a reporter. It is who I am. You have great power and great responsibility. Use it for good. You have access to everyone. You ask the questions no one else will. This skill will not help your dating life. Now I teach journalism. I miss the newsroom every day. I miss the energy, the deadlines, the crazy people. I miss the fight. I tell my students to ride the ride as long as they can. They will never regret it.'

Goodbye, Miss Barbara

I've always been fascinated with Bob Greene's memories of growing up in the 1950s in all-white, clean-cut Bexley, Ohio. His "Be True To Your School" used his diary of 1964, which covered part of his junior and part of his senior year, and gave those of us who never lived in that era a glimpse at what high-school days were like then, at least in a very comfortable, well-off town in the middle of the nation.

He often, in columns and books, mentions Miss Barbara, his kindergarten teacher. She apparently taught every kid in town and never forgot a name or a face. Even after retiring, she was in the lives of schoolchildren as a crossing guard. When Bob's friend Jack, he of ABCDJ fame, died, she was in the church at the funeral, and reached out and touched Bob's hand.

She died recently, and of course he memorialized her with a touching column.

Amazing and engrossing story

Now this is journalism. Can't wait for the next update.

Truer words

From Jack Shafer, recently laid-off media critic at Slate:

"I don't think any of us have been print journalists since 1996."

1996 was, in fact, the year I left my magazine job for Twin Cities Sidewalk, the now-dead Microsoft city guide.

Old-fashioned journalism

Love this video. Via Mediabistro. It's like another world, a million years ago and miles away.

Robots in control

Kids of Washington Post employees design the front page. Robots in control!

Santa, take it back!

New York Times recommends the ugliest gift ever -- a $985 teapot.

I can't imagine a teapot worth $985 unless it came with a butler to pour the tea or a plane ticket to England to enjoy the tea there.

Also from the NYT Picker: Professor, reporter fight over stupid Starbucks tweet. Sheesh, get a room, you two.

Two countries separated by a common language

Love this piece in the London Guardian, where their readers whine that too many Americanisms are slipping in to the newspaper's copy.

Excerpt: "words to incur the anger of some readers include first lady (for the prime minister's wife), kindergarten (for nursery), lawmakers, upcoming, people being raised rather than brought up, authorities ("I regard the use of the term 'authorities' as an dreadfully ugly American import from the land without style"), scuzzy, a slew of, happenstance, and "the increasing use of vacation for holiday, quite apart from the ghastly staycation."

Heh. Reminds me of Americans complaining about Spanish showing up more and more on billboards and the like. No one wants to change, they only want the words they grew up with.

Also, the end of the article kindly defends "suck."

It kind of reminds me of this, where Seattle film critic (and hilarious writer) Lindy West dared to mention Thanksgiving in a movie review she did for an English paper. Brits FREAKED OUT. NO WE DON'T KNOW THANKSGIVING YOU YANK BASTARDS WE'RE ALL GUY FAWKESING AND BOXING DAYING was pretty much the response.

Pass the lasagna

Sheesh, lamest AP "exclusive" EVAH.

Gods and mortals

Damn, now THIS is how you want your obituary to lead off. "...their bond was as fast and fateful as a mortal's coupling with a god."

Pass the free food and swag

Stuff Journalists Like has some things right, but not others. We do love the free food and the occasional exotic assignment, but we're not always so high on the low pay and weather stories.