Featuring National Magazine Awards' winning and finalist pieces, this anthology includes stories that cover a variety of subjects from Elizabeth Kolbert's investigation into global warming in the "New Yorker" and James Bamford's look at the PR campaign behind the Iraq War in "Rolling Stone" to Chris Heath's profile of Merle Haggard in "GQ".

Other writers include David Foster Wallace ( "The Atlantic Monthly"), Joyce Carol Oates ( "The Virginia Quarterly Review"), Priscilla Long ( "The American Scholar"), Jesse Katz ( "Los Angeles Magazine"), Marjorie Williams ( "Vanity Fair"), Hendrik Hertzberg ("New Yorker"), Sven Birkerts ( "The Virginia Quarterly Review"), Erik Reece ( "Harper's"), Wendy Brenner ("The Oxford American"), John Jeremiah Sullivan ("GQ"), James Wolcott ("Vanity Fair"), and Wyatt Mason ("Harper's"). Wide-ranging in their style and subjects, these writers' stories inform, surprise, entertain, and provide new perspectives on our world. They also reflect elements that distinguish the best in magazine writing such as: moral passion, investigative zeal, vivid characters and settings, persistent reporting, and artful writing.

Introduction, by Graydon Carter 1. Genome Tome, by Priscilla Long,
The American Scholar 2. The Man Who Sold the War, by James Bamford,
Rolling Stone 3. Host, by David Foster Wallace,
The Atlantic Monthly 4. The Recruit, by Jesse Katz,
Los Angeles Magazine 5. A Matter of Life and Death, by Marjorie Williams,
Vanity Fair 6. Mired, by Hendrik Hertzberg,
New Yorker 7. Humboldt's Gift, by Sven Birkerts,
The Virginia Quarterly Review 8. Death of a Mountain, by Erik Reece, Harper's 9. The Last Outlaw, by Chris Heath, GQ 10. Love and Death in the Cape Fear Serpentarium, by Wendy Brenner, The Oxford American 11. Girl Meets Bluegill, by Bill Heavey, Field and Stream 12. The Climate of Man -- I, by Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker 13. Upon This Rock, by John Jeremiah Sullivan, GQ 14. Caution: Women Seething, by James Wolcott, Vanity Fair 15. A World Unto Himself, by Wyatt Mason, Harper's 16. Smother, by Joyce Carol Oates, The Virginia Quarterly Review List of Contributors 2006 National Magazine Award Finalists National Magazine Award Winners, 1966--2006 ASME Board of Directors, 2005--2006 ASME Mission Statement