Foundation | Nieman Storyboard
Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter, delivered every Friday in your inbox. *** Dear Storyboard community: In this newsletter, we often grapple with how and when a journalist brings their own voice and experience into their stories. The truth is, the narrator is always there, guiding us along. But in what ways do they reveal themselves to the reader? This week's Nieman Storyboard podcast guest, author Claudia Rowe, set out to write a work of narrative nonfiction about the failu...| Nieman Storyboard
On the latest episode of the Nieman Storyboard podcast, journalist Claudia Rowe joins Storyboard Editor Mark Armstrong to discuss her most recent book, “Wards of the State: The Long Shadow of American Foster Care,” which has been named a finalist for the 2025 National Book Awards. “Wards of the State” is a narrative nonfiction book told through the stories of six former foster kids to examine the failures of the American foster care system. When Rowe began the book project, she set ...| Nieman Storyboard
Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter, delivered every Friday in your inbox. *** Dear Storyboard community: In Manjula Martin’s deep-dive Nieman Storyboard annotation of Susan Orlean’s classic Esquire feature, “The American Man, Age Ten,” Orlean was asked how she managed to blend in with a swarm of young kids at a New Jersey pizzeria to report out her 1992 profile of an ordinary fifth-grader named Colin Duffy. “I’m lucky to be small enough to escape too much notice,” she...| Nieman Storyboard
“As a trans person, I have to write news that makes me want to get up in the morning … stories that are more constructive than just, ‘Here's another thing that has been taken away from you.’”| Nieman Storyboard
Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter, delivered every Friday in your inbox. *** Dear Storyboard community, This week, Storyboard contributor (and amazing collage artist) Christina M. Tapper returns to our podcast for a conversation with journalist Danyel Smith, author of the pop music memoir “Shine Bright” and whose work has been published in The New York Times, ESPN, and NPR, among many other publications. Smith speaks to her evolution as a writer, historian, and journalist,...| Nieman Storyboard
On the latest episode of the Nieman Storyboard podcast, award-winning journalist, author, and producer Danyel Smith joins Storyboard contributor Christina M. Tapper to discuss building the confidence to tell her own story and being a model for others to do the same. Smith, the first woman and first Black person to serve as editor-in-chief of Vibe and who later served as editor of Billboard, is the author of “Shine Bright: A Very Personal History of Black Women in Pop.” The book is part ...| Nieman Storyboard
Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter, delivered every Friday in your inbox. *** Dear Storyboard community, My mission for this newsletter is to focus squarely on journalists who are doing the work, and what we can learn from them. If I admitted to a second, unspoken goal, it might be: “Let's not talk about AI.” I want Nieman Storyboard to celebrate the work that humans are uniquely capable of doing: Observing the world, and making sense of what is happening through storytelli...| Nieman Storyboard
A writer has a great idea they want to explore. They’ve done the research, the interviews, and possibly some writing. But what about the vivid scenes that readers remember the most? Scenes are essential for any great narrative. Seasoned writers have different methods of how to report and write them — but all of them involve careful planning, presence, interviewing, and detail-gathering. From the Nieman Storyboard archives, here are eight acclaimed journalists sharing their techniques on r...| Nieman Storyboard
Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter, delivered every Friday in your inbox. *** Dear Storyboard community, In 2010, reporter Michael Kruse followed the trail of a monkey that was on the loose in the Tampa Bay area. To tell the story, Kruse had to get inside the head of a young adult male rhesus macaque — where he went, what he ate, and what he was looking for. One thing he was looking for? A partner. The monkey was alone and seeking its kind. For the piece, Kruse consulted with...| Nieman Storyboard
The journalists share how they supported and learned from each other at the Tampa Bay Times and Politico.| Nieman Storyboard
The Interactives Visual Features Editor discusses the intersection of VR, interactive design, documentary work, and reporting| Nieman Storyboard
Samantha Michaels of Mother Jones followed the story of a woman given harsher punishment than the man who abused her daughter — and her| Nieman Storyboard
The power of one story, and the need for many. Plus: Maurice Carlos Ruffin on “getting your protagonist out of the house”| Nieman Storyboard
For many authors, making big edits for a story or book doesn't mean throwing out valuable work| Nieman Storyboard
Robert Sanchez of 5280 magazine reports on experiments around psilocybin therapy, while also using first person to tell his own story| Nieman Storyboard
A matrix of spreadsheets and physical calendars can help a writer organize notes, track scenes and visualize a story timeline| Nieman Storyboard
To gather the goods for a successful narrative, a central focus of interviewing needs to track the journey of situation or event| Nieman Storyboard
A narrative journalist and nonfiction author shares how she pre-reports to find a viable story and a compelling central character| Nieman Storyboard
Nonfiction journalist, author and teacher Kim Cross explores the techiniques she uses in interviewing for narrative stories| Nieman Storyboard
