june 2009
 

 

Jason Fagone, journalist & author
Working on a book about malaria,
vaccines, and the race to cure the world.
Hello and welcome. The malaria book is tentatively called The Dream Shot, and I'm writing it for the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House. It's about a high-stakes global effort to eradicate a disease that kills 1 million people every year. You can get a sense for some of the book's themes and characters by reading this story I wrote for Esquire magazine.
Crown also published my first book, Horsemen of the Esophagus, about the American culture of overeating. Horsemen was called "a stunning act of dissent" by the Wall Street Journal, "stylish" by the Village Voice, "probing" by Entertainment Weekly, "a pleasure" by the L.A. Times, "sly and vivid" by Newsday, and "extraordinary" by the U.K. Sunday Telegraph. I've also written freelance magazine articles for GQ, Esquire, the Atlantic Monthly, Philadelphia magazine, Slate, the New York Times, and others.
I'm 31 years old. I live in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA with my wife and daughter. More info on The Dream Shot to come. For now, email me or follow me on Twitter.

 

selected magazine work
 

The Video-Game Programmer Saving Our 21st-Century Souls
Jason Rohrer's solitary and stubborn quest for a future in which pixels and code and computers will make you cry and feel and love. (Esquire, December 2008)

Wrongful Death
Over the course of a century, Wolf Block grew into one of Philadelphia's most famous law firms. So what caused its sudden collapse in March? (Philadelphia, June 2009)

The Quack Slayer
Profile of vaccine advocate Dr. Paul Offit. (Philadelphia, June 2009)

The Hungary Job
A road trip across the Eastern Bloc with dozens of mustachioed Hungarians, a few jolly Czechs, two Slovenians, four Russians, three gung-ho dudes from the U.S. Department of Energy, and enough highly enriched uranium to destroy a city. (The Penn Stater, January/February 2009)

YouType: The strange allure of making your own fonts
(Slate, June 2008)

As Seen on YouTube (and Pretty Much Only on YouTube)
Profile of Vova Galchenko, the best young juggler in the world. (NY Times Play magazine, June 2008)

Jerry Blavat Finds the Fountain of Youth
The last doo-wop deejay. (Philadelphia, May 2008)

The Exterminators
The fight to eradicate tuberculosis. (Esquire, December 2007)

Horsemen of the Esophagus
Among the super-gluttons, on the front lines of competitive eating. (The Atlantic, May 2006)

The Great Gusto of Jimmy Binns
Profile of the most flamboyant lawyer in boxing. (Philadelphia, February 2006)

Press Lord 2.0
Profile of Brian Tierney, the self-made adman who bought the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Daily News. (Philadelphia, April 2007)

How Not to Play God
Stem-cell researcher Kent Vrana. (The Penn Stater, March/April 2007)