cover image The Best American Magazine Writing 2007

The Best American Magazine Writing 2007

, . . Columbia Univ., $16.95 (502pp) ISBN 978-0-231-14391-2

All of the essays in the series’ eighth year exhibit a timeless prose in the midst of meeting deadlines. But many also resonate with a special sense of timeliness, such as the insightful “Rules of Engagement” by William Langewiesche, a detailed study for Vanity Fair of the U.S. massacre of Iraqi citizens in the town of Haditha. Other essays have a similar sense of urgency: “Inside Scientology” by Janet Reitman for Rolling Stone —the result of a nine-month investigation—is a terrific and balanced look at an organization whose top leaders assert that false ideas, “including the concepts of God, Christ, and organized religion,” date back 75 million years to the work of “an evil galactic warrior named Xenu.” C.J. Chivers’s “The School” for Esquire is a harrowing account of the three-day siege by Chechen terrorists of a grammar school in the Russian town of Beslan. Other, lighter pieces include Vanessa Grigoriadis’s skillful depiction for New York of the crazy-like-a-fox business and personal lifestyle of “Karl Lagerfeld, Boy Prince of Fashion.” (Dec. 26)