Profiles

City Life

Anwar Faisal: Lord of the Sties

Anwar Faisal has built an empire renting to the city’s college students, but he hasn’t been so good at making sure his apartments are actually habitable.

City Life

Kelly Ayotte: The Elephant Woman

Can New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte save the national Republican party? Maybe, but first she’ll have to get reelected in her own state.

City Life

Joyce Linehan: The Decider

Joyce Linehan convinced Elizabeth Warren to run for Senate and helped Marty Walsh become mayor. But will the former punk-rock promoter ever take center stage?

Arts & Entertainment

Game Changer: Kevin Levine

Ken Levine wanted to be a screenwriter in Hollywood. Instead he wound up in Quincy doing something much more lucrative—breaking violent new ground in the world’s youngest art form: video games.

City Life

Danny Ainge Goes Back to the Drawing Board

Pierce? Gone. Garnett? Adios. Doc Rivers? See ya. Danny Ainge spent the summer blowing up his team, and now it’s up to the cocksure Celtics boss to figure out how to return the franchise to glory. With a new season starting and everything uncertain, at least one thing is clear: We’re about to find out if Ainge is as smart as he thinks he is.

Arts & Entertainment

Baser Natures: Andre Dubus III Profile

In his new book, Dirty Love, Andre Dubus III conjures up characters who struggle through a lurid wilderness of sex. For the writer, that’s the path not taken: “We tend to write about what haunts us.”

City Life

A Mayor in Full

It once seemed like Tom Menino would be mayor for life. But earlier this year, after two decades running the city, he surprised everyone by announcing he wouldn’t seek another term. When he steps down in January, he’ll leave a monumental legacy. This month, we explore the mayor’s time in office, from his stalwart support of LGBT rights to the developers who struck it rich on the waterfront. There isn’t one single story of Menino’s Boston, there are hundreds—each bearing his unmistakable thumbprint.

City Life

America’s Most Wanted?

In the aftermath of the marathon bombings, Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis became a national media celebrity. Some reports even had him being considered for secretary of homeland security. Where did these rumors come from, and what do they tell us about Davis himself?

City Life

Clean Sweep: Doug Rubin

Can Doug Rubin—known for his willingness to do the unglamorous work that’s required to win—build the state’s next great Democratic dynasty?

City Life

City Limits: Meet Boston’s 2013 Mayoral Candidates

As candidates scramble for votes in the first wide-open mayoral election in decades, a transformed Boston begins to emerge.

City Life

Black & Blue: Damien Echols

Convicted of murdering three young boys, Damien Echols spent 18 years on death row until a series of documentaries and articles destroyed the case against him. He’s free now, but as he attempts to rebuild his life in Salem, will a city best known for its witch hunts ever let him?

City Life

Carol Johnson’s Boston Public

As Carol Johnson prepares to step down after six tumultuous years as Boston’s superintendent of schools, her job performance has become a central issue in the city’s first competitive mayoral race in a generation. Critics portray her as an ineffective steward, while her admirers say she’s been a compassionate leader. So how’d she do, really?

City Life

Naked Joe

One hundred years ago, Joe Knowles stripped down to his jockstrap, said goodbye to civilization, and marched off into the woods to prove his survival skills. He returned home to a hero’s welcome. That’s when things got interesting.

City Life

Scott Lively: The Crusader

After an incendiary 2009 visit to Uganda during which he urged leaders to fight the “gay agenda,” Scott Lively is now being sued for persecution—a crime against humanity. So what’s next for the Springfield pastor? He’s exploring a run for governor, of course.

Leandro Barbosa
City Life

Goooaaaal!—Leandro Barbosa and the Global Future of Basketball

International players like Leandro Barbosa represent the future of basketball, which the NBA hopes soon to transform into a global game that will rival soccer in popularity—and profit.