IT’S A DAY of rest, and you may be in the mood for a quiet corner and a comfy chair.
We’ve hand-picked the week’s best reads for you to savour.
Pauline Dakin had a very unusual childhood in Canada, full of secrets and lies. She, her sister and mum went on the run, and when she found out why, the truth astounded her. But there were even more twists and turns to come.
(BBC, approx 18 mins reading time)
Apart from this, life was quite normal for Pauline’s family – they’d start again and build a new life in a new town. But below the surface Pauline was confused, anxious and falling into depression. ”I knew something bad was happening,” she says. “I didn’t know what it was, but there was always a sense of something dire that was unspoken.”
This story about a terrible, terrible roommate will give you chills.
(NY Mag, approx 37 mins reading time)
Strange things began to happen. One evening, Miller came home to find the living-room lights wouldn’t turn on — Creek had taken the bulbs and screwed them into lamps in his bedroom. A few days later, the six chairs at the kitchen table disappeared. Miller knocked on Creek’s door, and when he opened it she saw he’d fashioned them into a desk. Miller had assumed Creek spent his days in court, but neighbors said they saw him loitering on the property throughout the afternoon.
This piece looks at the group of teens who banded together in the wake of the Florida shootings to try and bring in gun control to the US.
(Buzzfeed, approx 7 mins reading time)
Kasky was exhausted. He estimated that he’d done more than 50 interviews since the shooting, all to promote a movement against gun violence that he and his young friends have spearheaded in the wake of their school’s tragedy. “We, as a community, needed one thing,” he said of his desire to form the group to give his friends a purpose amid the grief.
Spring Kwok writes about having a stutter, and what it’s like to have people talking over her when she’s trying to speak.
(Narratively, approx 10 mins reading time)
When I’m stuttering, my jaw locks, I lose control of my tongue, and my lower back tenses like I’ve been sitting upright for hours. In between the words I can get out and the words I want to say, time lapses and my consciousness spills over the empty pit like hot coffee. I can feel my throat close up like an allergic reaction while I tilt my head more to the right to let whoever is waiting for my words know that I’m still with them, even though it feels like I’m not.
This in-depth article details the shocking murder of Lynette White, and how it spiralled into awful circumstances for the alleged suspect.
(BBC, approx 46 mins reading time)
Lying on her back, she was fully clothed, her t-shirt and stone-washed jeans partially covered by a black leather coat. Even in murky light it was clear; she was dead. As the officer radioed for back-up, a woman waiting on the landing outside the entrance to the flat started to cry.
6. What happened to Brendan Fraser?
Remember the actor Brendan Fraser? He was everywhere for years, then disappeared. Now he’s back acting, and he has an incredible – and at times shocking – story to tell.
(GQ, approx 26 mins reading time)
I’m 35: There was a time when the sight of Fraser was as familiar to me as the furniture in my parents’ house. He was in Encino Man and School Ties in 1992, Airheads in 1994, George of the Jungle in 1997, The Mummy in 1999. If you watched movies at the end of the previous century, you watched Brendan Fraser. And though his run as a leading man in studio films lasted to the end of this past decade, he’s been missing, or at least somewhere off in the margins, for some time now.
…AND A CLASSIC FROM THE ARCHIVES…
Andrew Tillin’s marriage was unravelling, but he sought solace in cycling.
(Outside, approx 21 mins reading time)
The leap into the unknown in Texas became a plunge into darkness. Confused, furious, and depressed, I was suddenly just another man in his forties enduring a marriage breakup. Increasingly sad and seeing my kids only half-time, I looked for something to settle my anxieties. Alcohol wasn’t an option—I’m not a big drinker. I couldn’t swing a Porsche. So I turned to the machine and sport that, for decades, had brought me joy.
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