Heart of the Matter: A Special Series
In this collection, we explore everything from an epic heartbreak, to a life-saving operation with a twist, to a true mystery involving suspicious infant deaths, and more.
This special collaboration from Narratively and Creative Nonfiction is made possible by support from the Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes and the School for the Future of Innovation in Society at Arizona State University.
If there’s one thing many writers love, it is limitations. That might sound counterintuitive, but it can be such a fun challenge to be given a set of parameters and then have to figure out how to create something great within them. That’s what it’s been like to collaborate with Creative Nonfiction over the last year and change on the several themed issues we’ve put out together. For Heart of the Matter, our most recent, we put love and romance under the microscope and examined it in all sorts of ways. (Check out the ones that came before this, The Art of Narrative Storytelling and The Ever-Present Liquid, too.)
The stories we’ve brought you over the last few months have delved into the complexities of the human heart, both literal and metaphorical. There was one about a woman’s path to healing her broken heart in an unexpected way; another on how to use “heart medicine” to mend a marriage; the penultimate piece about the promise of a heart transplant from an extraordinary donor; and lastly, a story about a group of infants with heart problems who died mysterious deaths, and the search to find out why. It has been such a pleasure to find these stories, work on them exhaustively until they were just right and then share them with you. So, if you missed any of them the first time, or caught one or two but didn’t realize they were part of a whole series, here is the entire wonderful issue of Heart of the Matter all in one place. Read, share with a friend (or many!) and enjoy.
—Jesse Sposato, executive editor of Narratively
#1: What’s the Opposite of Taking Someone’s Virginity?
Story by Elizabeth Laura Nelson
I finally slept with my best friend, just before he died—and I started to fall apart after he was gone. Then a conversation with his ghost—and a perilous trek through the woods—changed everything.
#2: Our Therapist Gave My Wife and Me MDMA—and It Saved Our Marriage
Story by Seth Lorinczi
Julianna and I were on the brink of breaking up when we were met with an unexpected proposal that changed the way we saw ourselves and each other, forever.
#3: How Do You Ask a Dying Man to Accept a Pig’s Heart?
Story by Dr. Bartley Griffith
After all other life-saving measures had been exhausted, a new human organ seemed like the best answer for one very sick patient. But when that became impossible, there was only one thing left to try.
#4: Dozens of Infants Died Mysteriously at a Top Children’s Hospital—I Wanted to Know Why
Story by Leigh Kamping-Carder
Years after the suspicious deaths occurred at the very hospital where I spent time as a baby, I decided to investigate what happened. Had this been a mass murder or a tragic coincidence?
Note: Audio narration is available for all published stories via the Substack app, which you can download here.