Ignore the tedious pundits bloviating about shrunken attention spans. There has never been a better time to immerse yourself in long, deep, rich science reporting. Here’s a list of my 12 top pieces of the year, a list that was so hard to compile that I added a 13th. In no particular order:

“The first thing Cathy Hutchinson became aware of upon waking from three weeks in the quiet of a coma was the rhythmic alternation of surge then draw: whoosh, hiss, whoosh, hiss. As the contours of a room began to resolve before her eyes, she discovered the source of the sounds—a ventilator machine beside her bed.”

“The voice is deep and loud–not loud from shouting, but from some strange acoustic