Our senior editor gives her picks for her favorite stories of the year.

Did 2022 shake up American priorities? In some ways, yes. A new big-city mayor arrived on the scene set to battle with shibboleths. Voters stepped up to slap down "expert" assumptions about abortion rights, inflation, threats to democracy, and more. Midterm contests like the Maine governor’s race were blowouts. But the look back is also grim. The Georgia Senate race was too close for comfort, a dismal commentary on race relations. More kids died in preventable school shootings as Congress ferreted out incremental gun control and called it progress. People everywhere played down drought, stronger storms, and receding waterways. The challenges pile up with few satisfying resolutions in sight as we turn the page to another year.

Here are some of my favorite pieces from 2022:

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu means to tear down the old ways of doing business in the Hub’s troubled housing sector.

Drought is the climate scourge that most Southerners ignore.

Congress serves up the legislative equivalent of thoughts and prayers on school shootings.

Saving democracy is a work in progress: Maine shuts down Trumpism; Georgia barely does.

African Americans are never American enough.

~ GABRIELLE GURLEY