Gideon Lewis-Kraus is a writer at large for the New York Times Magazine, a contributing writer at WIRED, and a contributing editor at Harper’s. He’s the author of a travel memoir called A Sense of Direction, and he teaches nonfiction in the Graduate Writing Program at Columbia. Here, he talks with Jacob about ideal story length (100 pages, anyone?), why it took months to work out the structure of his latest NYT Magazine piece, how he uses detail, and more.

Stories mentioned in the conversation:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/23/magazine/selling-airborne-opulence-to-the-upper-upper-upper-class.html

https://www.wired.com/story/tezos-blockchain-love-story-horror-story/

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/17/magazine/ancient-dna-paleogenomics.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/14/magazine/the-great-ai-awakening.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/13/magazine/how-the-resistance-helped-democrats-dominate-virginia.html