At these frighteningly realistic boot camps, reporters like me train to cover everything from endless war to deadly pandemics — and create camaraderie that we’ll carry to every assignment.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

Robert Holmes taught his sons everything he knew about exposing black-market knockoffs. Now they take down the world's biggest scammers while dodging threats from the mob.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

Through a life of crime that spanned five decades, Linda Calvey’s husbands and lovers kept turning up dead. Now she’s out of prison, turning 72 today, and determined to clear her name.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

At work, I’m a ghost: always heard, never seen. But mastering the voices of celebrities and politicians helped me learn to speak for myself.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

He’s been a Beverly Hills rich kid, a teen on the run with his drug-kingpin dad, and a homeless father scraping to get by. Next stop for Blair Cobbs: world champion boxer.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

As a freelance journalist, I’ve struggled financially for years. Then the pandemic hit and I got thrown on the street. But I will go on — I always do.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

After the loss of three loved ones, Jacqui McLoughlin was debilitated from grief. Then one moment at a Flaming Lips concert changed everything.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

In this time of Islamophobia and hatred, I needed to understand what made a white stranger open her home to us.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

Interned during WWI, circus entertainer Joseph Pilates used found materials and his fellow prisoners as his test lab, and imagined an exercise system that would captivate millions.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe

As a kid, I thought I was too fat to dress up as my favorite cartoon characters. As an adult, I discovered a subculture that became one of the greatest joys of my life.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.narratively.com/subscribe