What’s in a word? A culture war.

Hey, yuppie heathens— are you ready to be saved? Then meet Pastor Scott Rourk, who’s come up from Georgia to troll for your soul.

How Susan Sontag became seduced by her own persona.

Times reporter Judith Miller landed behind bars for a story she didn’t write about a crime she didn’t commit. Our easy reference guide to how it was that the media ended up on trial.

The beleaguered Wall Street Journal hopes to find calmer water as it sails into the weekend with its Saturday edition. Now if only the crew would stop jumping ship.

Pulitzer Prize winner Judith Miller’s series of exclusives about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq—courtesy of the now-notorious Ahmad Chalabi—helped the New York Times keep up with the competition and the Bush administration bolster the case for war. How the very same talents that caused her to get the story also caused her to get it wrong.

It wasn’t just E. L. Doctorow who looked into the past this year—though some didn’t look too far, with one 9/11 novel outshining the rest. Brooklyn writers kept themselves busy (when not feuding), graphic books continued to pop, Joan Didion redeemed the memoir, Mary Gaitskill made us happy-sad, and Donald Trump defended his authorial honor.